Lunchtime Lecture: We Are Stardust

Image credit: NASA, ESA, the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA), A. Nota (ESA/STScI), and the Westerlund 2 Science Team

12–1 PM
Free with Museum admission

How are all complex life forms—including humans—closely connected to the universe? Raja (Puragra) GuhaThakurta, professor of astronomy and astrophysics at the University of California, Santa Cruz, will discuss the ways the Milky Way and other galaxies act as “recycling plants” for life-bearing chemical elements and serve as important bridges that connect all living things to the universe that surrounds them. Using the latest astronomical images obtained by telescopes on Earth and in space, alongside state-of-the-art computer simulations, GuhaThakurta will look at the formation of galaxies as part of the so-called cosmic web. GuhaThakurta provided imagery for Diana Thater’s new installation, Science, Fiction.

Lunchtime Lectures take place on the first Wednesday of the month at noon in the Charlotte Wendel Education Center. Visitors are welcome to bring food and beverages.