Dave Charbonneau has been selected for a 2023 Everett I. Mendelsohn Excellence in Mentoring Award (https://engage.gsas.harvard.edu/news/218515) . This is hosted by the Graduate Student Council and is presented annually to one or more Harvard faculty members on the basis of nominations from GSAS students. ...
NASA is funding 30 awards across the U.S to implement the next phase of Science Activation—a community-based approach to connect NASA science with learners of all ages.
The Astronomy project is entitled Cosmic Storytelling with NASA Data (CosmicDS). The CosmicDS project will facilitate connections between astronomers who want to tell the story of a discovery and inspire learners by letting them interrogate the data behind the story on their own, using easy-to-use but powerful data science and visualization techniques. ...
Citations reads: "The 2020 Gruber Cosmology Prize recognizes Lars Hernquist, Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian, and Volker Springel, Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics, for their defining contributions to cosmological simulations, a method that tests existing theories of, and inspires new investigations into, the formation of structures at every scale from stars to galaxies to the universe itself."
The President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) is an advisory group of the Nation's leading scientists and engineers, appointed by the President to augment the science and technology advice available to him from inside the White House and from cabinet departments and other Federal agencies. Prof. Loeb's nomination is subject to approval by Congress. Also nominated was Dr. Daniela Rus, Andrew and Erna Viterbi Professor of Engineering and Computer Science at MIT and director of MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence...
"We do not yet know how life first formed on earth, but no scientist argues that it can never be explained in material terms. How prevalent is life throughout the universe? We now know that there are likely even more planets than there are stars. So, is life in the cosmos prevalent or rare? Either answer yields profound implications."
"The rate of growth of new technologies is often proportional to past knowledge, leading to an exponential advance over time. This explosive process implies that very quickly after a civilization reaches technological maturity, it will develop the means for its own destruction through climate change, for example, or nuclear, biological or chemical weapons. Developments of this type, over mere hundreds of years, would appear abrupt in the cosmic perspective of billions of years. If such self-destruction is common, this could explain Fermi’s paradox, which asks “where is everybody?”—and...
"Active galactic nuclei (AGNs) --- powered by supermassive black holes at the centers of most young galaxies --- may have put the quash on life’s evolution, says one new study."
"Hundreds of astronomy enthusiasts filled every available seat to listen to Astronomy Department Chair Abraham “Avi” Loeb describe recent innovations in the search for life beyond our solar system."
