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Schedule including this lecture.
Goddard Space Flight Center Engineering Colloquium
Date: Monday, October 15, 2001
New observatories are now being completed worldwide that will give us a whole new sense with which to explore the heavens. Instead of collecting light waves, these novel instruments will allow astronomers to place their hands upon the fabric of space-time and feel the very rhythms of the universe. These vibrations in space-time -- called gravity waves -- are the last prediction of Einstein's general theory of relativity yet to be observed directly. They are his unfinished symphony. Gravity waves will provide the first direct evidence of black holes and allow us to eavesdrop on the remnant echo of the Big Bang itself. In her talk, Marcia Bartusiak will tell the story of the exciting 40-year-long quest to capture these waves, introducing us to the people, the technology, and the science of this fascinating enterprise, in which the Goddard Space Flight Center is participating. She will give us a sneak preview of the first new astronomy of the 21st century.
Combining her skills as a journalist with an advanced degree in physics, Marcia Bartusiak has been covering the fields of astronomy and physics for more than two decades. She is the author of "Thursday's Universe," a layman's guide to the frontiers of astrophysics and cosmology. She also authored "Through a Universe Darkly," a history of astronomers' centuries-long quest to discover the universe's composition, and, most recently, "Einstein's Unfinished Symphony," which recounts the on-going attempt to detect gravity waves and won this year's American Institute of Physics Science Writing Award.
For many years a contributing editor at Discover, she is now on the editorial advisory board of Astronomy magazine. She also reviews science books for both The New York Times and The Washington Post. In 1982, Bartusiak was the first woman to receive the Science Writing Award from the AIP. She was also a finalist in NASA's Journalist-in-Space competition. She was a Knight Fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and for several years following was an Adjunct Professor of Journalism in Boston University's graduate science-writing program.
Colloquium Committee Sponsor: Brent Warner
Engineering Colloquium home page: https://ecolloq.gsfc.nasa.gov