Event

A Conversation with the Stars

Dr. Ralph Bird is a currently a postdoctoral researcher at the University of California, Los Angeles, though he was once a nuclear safety engineer for Rolls-Royce Plc. As cool as both civil and submarine power plants were, the lure of research pulled Dr. Bird towards the two fascinating instruments he now uses: GAPS (a balloon borne experiment searching for antinucleon cosmic rays) and VERITAS (a very-high-energy gamma ray telescope array).

Studying cosmic rays, which are extremely fast moving subatomic particles, can tell astronomers a lot about the objects that produce them, and perhaps even how those objects are able to accelerate the particles to such high velocities. Such awesome accelerating power must come from somewhere and Dr. Bird is working to understand the physics of such extreme environments.

Dr. Bird also examines how very high energy gamma rays (electromagnetic radiation) that can be used to understand those cosmic rays. In particular, by studying galactic gamma ray sources and searching for gamma ray as well as optical emission associated with fast bursts of radio energy, he hopes to constrain (and hopefully find!) dark matter through indirect observations.

Hes got a lot of cool stuff to tell you about, so please join him, and the planetarium team, on May 25th for a conversation about the universe.