UF participates in nation’s largest science and technology festival

2010 Edition UF's participants, in front of their booth 

 

The University of Florida’s departments of astronomy, mechanical and aerospace engineering, and the Institute of Food & Agricultural Sciences will participate in the USA Science & Engineering Festival in Washington, D.C., Saturday and Sunday.

The theme of the UF booth is “Gators in Space,” where displays and interactive activities will be used to explain how astronomy and engineering allow a better understanding of the universe and life on Earth.

At the UF booth, Expo visitors will have the opportunity to build their own working telescopes, experience the physical principles needed to control a spacecraft, and handle samples of simulated Lunar and Martian regolith (planetary “soil”) and the palm-sized plant system launched to the International Space Station.

Static and dynamic displays will show how the university is using cutting-edge science and technology to provide solutions to challenges that the world is facing. The booth will have displays of the hardware used for the exploration of space: SwampSat, the first 4-inch-cubed satellite designed and built at UF; a scale model of the Gran Telescopio Canarias, the world’s largest telescope, used by UF astronomers for their research; an orbital plant growth facility and a clinostat (ground-based hardware used to disrupt the effect of gravity sensing in biology). Students and researchers will be available to demonstrate and discuss each of these items.

The USA Science & Engineering Festival is the country’s only national science festival. Its aim is to increase the public’s awareness of the importance of science and to encourage youths to pursue careers in science and engineering. The fair is a month-long celebration, culminating in a two-day exposition including 100 live performances and 3,000 different hands-on activities by more than 500 of the nation’s leading science and engineering organizations. It is free and open to the public.

“The previous Expo held in October of 2010 was a celebration of science; we had many visitors attending the UF booth, including a number of UF alumni. They were very impressed with the kinds of science and engineering projects that were coming out of their alma mater,” said Ata Sarajedini, professor of astronomy who is the overall coordinator of the UF group.

“We have created an official twitter @GatorsinSpace so people can follow all of our activities,” said Dante Buckley, a participating UF engineering doctoral student who is also a member of professor Norman Fitz-Coy’s SwampSat team.

Eric Schultz, an IFAS doctoral student in the space biology program of Robert Ferl and Anna-Lisa Paul, is excited about the opportunity to show visitors advances in biological research in space, “This is a great opportunity to promote interest in the biological sciences and to educate the public about the benefits of astrobiology and extraterrestrial research in general,” Schultz said.

The following video was aired by the local news, before last expo's edition.

The participation of UF at this festival has been made possible by the UF provost’s office, department of astronomy, Florida Space Grant Consortium, the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, the College of Engineering, the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences and Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences and the Office of Admissions.

The Observatory

This fine video has been created by Peter Nguyen, a physics and astronomy undergraduate in his final semester.

He enjoys photography and is currently enroled in the graduate observational techniques course taught by Dr. Telesco, which provides him with plenty of time out at the Department’s Rosemary Hill Observatory (RHO).

It was there that he shot “The Observatory” over the past month. “A lot of sleepless and sometimes chilly nights went into making this. And as you can see from the clouds, not much useful observing!” Peter says. Early in the video, Nguyen captures a lightning storm in the distance, which luckily stayed far enough away from RHO to do some observing this night.

Peter also had some help the last few nights. Stefan O’Dougherty, who graduated from UF Astronomy in May, visited to help, and contributed the motion shots using his telescope mount. The last time these two students paired up, a NASA Astronomy Picture of theDay was the result. Whatever happens with this video, Peter is still happy, “I shoot these for fun … I’m glad RHO has such dark skies, relatively. And I’m quite pleased with how beautifully all the time-lapes came together!”

Michael Mumma's lecture available on Youtube

Last Thursday, at Starry Night, we had the opportunity to attend to a lecture by Dr. Michael Mumma titled “The search for life in Mars”. If you missed it, it's available in UF astronomy department’s account in Youtube.

Michael J. Mumma was educated at Franklin and Marshall College (A.B. 1963, Physics), and the University of Pittsburgh (Ph. D. 1970, Physics) and joined NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center thereafter.

He is founding Director of the Goddard Center for Astrobiology and Senior Scientist in the Solar System Exploration Division.

He thrice received the NASA's rarely given Medal for Exceptional Scientific Achievement; the fist time was in 1988 for originating and developing a concept for detecting cometary parent volatiles by solar infrared fluorescence, with it achieving the first detection of water vapor in comets. He also led the team that discovered the saturated hydrocarbons methane and ethane in comets, being awarded for the second time in 1997 for that work. In 2009 he was awarded for the first definite detection of methane on Mars with the John C. Lindsay Memorial Prize, Goddard’s highest recognition for scientific achievement, and also the NASA’s Medal for the third time.

He is an elected Fellow of the American Physical Society and of the Washington Academy of Sciences. In 1999, the International Astronomical Union named Asteroid 8340 "Michael J. Mumma" in his honor.  He received the Alumni Citation for Distinguished Career Achievement from Franklin & Marshall College, one of only four Alumni so honored in 2008.

During the lecture at Starry Night
“FLMNH photo by Kristen Grace.”

UFAstro partners USA Science and Engineering Festival

If you check the UF Astronomy website, under affiliations and partners, you’ll find a new logo. It’s the one from the USA Science and Engineering Festival.

In its 2012 edition, UF astronomy, IFAS and Engineering will partner to set up a booth at the USA Science and Engineering Expo, to be held April 28^th & 29^th at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in Washington D.C. 

This Expo is the nation’s largest celebration of all things science and engineering and features over 1500 hands-on activities and over 75 performances. You can learn more about the upcoming activities on their blog.

UF Astronomy and Engineering sponsored a booth during the October 2010 edition of the Expo, which was held on the National Mall in Washington, DC. The booth was a spectacular success attracting over 7,000 people during the two days of the 2010 Expo.

Don't miss the largest celebration of science in the US!

Check out some pictures of 2011 edition:

From Telescopes to Satellites!

Engineering graduate student Katie Cason showing
a replica of one of small satellites.

Astronomy undergraduate Stefan O'Dougherty
 building a Galileoscope with one of the
 many visitors.

Assembling a Galileoscope kit was
a popular activity.

National Mall was a great location!

A group picture of the team just before the expo
 opened on Saturday morning.

Our friends at Channel 20 didn't miss the story!

Shuttle Launch

by Francisco Reyes

An amazing view of the launch of the Discovery shuttle, mission STS-131!

The video recording was made from the roof of the Astronomy building at the University of Florida Campus in Gainesville, FL.

Like many other people, I was expecting the "exciting" part of the launch to end after the separation of the solid rocket boosters. Normally the shuttle main engines get faint after the separation, but about a minute after separation they became brighter and a comet-like cloud began to form around the shuttle. I have seen several night launch and this is the first in which I saw this effect. According to NASA sources, it was the illumination of the exhaust plume of the shuttle engines by the rising sun, rapidly expanding due to the low pressure and density of the atmosphere at that altitude.

An spectacular view that will remain in our memories of one of the last flights of the shuttle!

What do astronomers do?

Former graduate student Jorge Pérez-Gallego, now a Master of Fine Arts student at the University of Florida's School of Art and Art History, donated his last piece to our department.

What do astronomers do? is an educational flash animation that mixes video interviews, imagery, and typography in order to demystify the image of the astronomer and bringing it closer to a broad audience.

For his purpose, Jorge had the pleasure to interview several members of our department, including our Chair, Rafael Guzmán, and our Associate Chair, Ata Sarajedini. The interviews also included professors Vicki Sarajedini and Eric Ford, doctorates Ashley Espy and Bruno Ferreira, and graduate students Scott Fleming, Nestor Lasso, Enrique López, Jesús Martínez, Robert Morehead, and Izaskun San Roman. Also, both Rafael Guzmán and María Rogal, a professor and Jorge's adviser at the School of Art and Art History, helped him with the final polishing of his work.

Furthermore, the included high definition video interviews are now available through our youtube channel.

what do
astronomers
do? by jorge pérez-gallego

Answers to the question you have been always wondering about..