Eric Sembrat's Test Bonanza

On Monday, Nov. 11, 2019, the planet Mercury will pass across the disk of the sun. The rare celestial event can be viewed with the eye-safe telescopes of the Georgia Tech Observatory. This planetary transit is rare, occurring only around 13 times each century. “This will be the last such event visible from Georgia Tech until 2049,” says James Sowell, director of the Georgia Tech Observatory.

The transit begins at 7:36 AM and ends at 1:04 PM. The observatory will have eye-safe telescopes available during the entirety of the transit.

Contact jim.sowell@physics.gatech.edu if you have questions.

The School of Physics and the Society of Physics Students will host a public debate between faculty from the College of Science and the College of Computing to answer this question.  This event is free and open to the all.  There will be time at the conclusion of the debate for audience members to direct questions towards the faculty panel.

Since 2015, Georgia Tech's Three Minute Thesis (3MT®) competition has helped graduate students hone their communication skills by challenging them to share their research in three minutes in a way anyone could understand.

From the College of Sciences, physics Ph.D. student Lin Xin and chemistry/biochemistry Ph.D. student Suttipong "Jay" Suttapitugsakul are finalists in the 2019 Georgia Tech 3 Minute Thesis Competition.

Xin's presentation is titled "Beat the Quantum Limit." His research is about doing precise measurements beyond the most precise quantum limit by using cold atoms. His principal investigator is School of Physics Professor Michael Chapman.

Suttapitugsakul's presentation is titled "Not Just a Sugar Coating! Understanding the Language of Cells through Their Sweet Surface."  He studies the roles and functions of cell-surface glycoproteins by integrating mass-spectrometry based proteomics with chemical and enzymatic reactions. The goal is to better understand how cell type, cell state, and extracellular environment affects cell-surface glycoproteins in order to discover new biomarkers and drug targets. His principal investigator is Ronghu Wu, an associate professor in the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry.

For more information about 3MT, visit grad.gatech.edu/3MT.

Professor De Heer will be speaking on the topic of The Future is Paved in Epigraphene. The talk will discuss how Graphene has been widely advertised as the new wonder material that can be produced by exfoliating graphite, using Scotch tape, down to a sheet that is one atom thick. Because it is a 2-dimensional material, it was expected to revolutionize electronics, but 15 years of exfoliated graphene research has failed to even remotely meet this challenge. Starting in 2000, the Georgia Tech epigraphene electronics group has taken a different approach to graphene-based nanoelectronics, by growing it on single crystals of silicon carbide, using a method that was known for more than 50 years. This form of graphene, called epigraphene, has not only shown a wide variety of important new properties, it also is intrinsically compatible with industrial nanoelectronics fabrication methods.  In this talk I will discuss the historical development of epigraphene starting in the 1880’s and working up to the present day. I will focus on those aspects that sets graphene apart from other electronic materials as well as our recent discoveries of new ballistic edge states and how their quantum mechanical properties might be utilized in a new generation of electronics that utilizes electronic wave interference, like in optics.

The ExplOrigins group is hosting the 3rd annual Exploration and Origins Colloquium on January 27th and 28th, in another example of Georgia Tech’s thriving collaboration between the astrobiology and space science communities.The program kicks off with a poster session on Monday, Jan. 27, and continues with plenary lectures, contributed talks, and a networking session on Tuesday, Jan. 28.

The interdisciplinary colloquium will highlight space exploration science, as well as  biological, geological, and astronomical origins research in the Georgia Institute of Technology and neighboring universities. The colloquium aims to forge relationships among diverse individuals, encourage collaboration and interdisciplinary understanding, and kick-start fundable projects requiring the skills and expertise of multilab teams.

The colloquium will begin with a poster session on the evening of the 27th where attendees will show off their latest work in an environment conducive to interdisciplinary collaboration. Activities on the 28th include a day-long seminar with twelve contributed talks, and highlighted keynote addresses by: Mariel Borowitz of Georgia Tech’s Sam Nunn School of International Affairs, and Christopher Carr of MIT and Massachusetts General Hospital. This colloquium takes place in the context of a burgeoning astrobiology community at Georgia Tech, with the Institute having recently hosted the Astrobiology Graduate Conference in 2018 and announced the host of Astrobiology Science Conference in 2021.

Register here.

Check here for schedule.

CANCELLED: The College of Sciences regrets to announce that William Daniel Phillips is unable to host this Frontiers in Science lecture. We look forward to welcoming Phillips to Georgia Tech for a rescheduled lecture this fall.

At the beginning of the 20th century, Einstein changed how we think about time. Now, early in the 21st century, the measurement of time is being revolutionized by the ability to cool a gas of atoms to temperatures millions of times lower than any naturally occurring temperature in the universe.   

Atomic clocks, the best timekeepers ever made, are one of the scientific and technological wonders of modern life.  Such super-accurate clocks are essential to industry, commerce, and science; they are the heart of the global positioning system (GPS), which guides cars, airplanes, and hikers to their destinations. 

Today, the best primary atomic clocks use ultracold atoms, achieve accuracies of about one second in 300 million years, and are getting better all the time. At the same time, a new generation of atomic clocks is leading us to re-define what we mean by time.  

Super-cold atoms, with temperatures that can be below a billionth of a degree above absolute zero, use and allow tests of some of Einstein's strangest predictions. 

This public lecture will be a lively, multimedia presentation, including exciting experimental demonstrations and down-to-earth explanations about some of today's hottest (and coolest) science.

About the Speaker

William Daniel Phillips is an American physicist who shared the 1997 physics prize with Steven Chu (US) and Claude Cohen-Tannoudji (France). All three developed methods of cooling and trapping atoms using lasers.

Phillips is a physicist in the National Institute of Standards and Technology.

In addition to laser cooling and trapping of neutral atoms, Phillips also researches atomic-gas Bose-Einstein condensates and quantum information with single-atom qubits.

In the wake of the Covid-19 outbreak, universities have quickly shifted their classes online. But opening up research labs, and ongoing scientific experiments to remote possibilities is a much harder task. As colleges potentially reopen, how do labs and research resources factor in? And how do key funding sources factor into that planning? Hear from College of Sciences Dean and Betsy Middleton and John Clark Sutherland Chair Susan Lozier, along with experts from NIH and University of Michigan. Join the virtual seminar at 2 p.m. EDT on July 16.

Without leaving the comfort of your home, on October 22 you can enjoy an evening under the stars, guided by the Georgia Tech Observatory. This is the Observatory's third online public night, preceded by many years of in-person public nights on the roof of Howey Physics Building. Tune in here at 8 PM ET to watch the live stream.

Viewers will be treated to a live tour of the Moon, Jupiter, Saturn, and Mars by Observatory Director James Sowell, as shown through the lense of a Georgia Tech telescope to a live stream on YouTube. The stream is dependent on clear weather to happen.

Read more about the Observatory's inaugural online public night, which took place on May 7, and save the YouTube channel to your calendar for the October 22 online public night.

Patton Distinguished Professors Joshua S. Weitz and Greg Gibson will join JulieAnne Williamson, Executive Director of Sustainability and Building Operations at Georgia Tech and Team Lead for Campus Surveillance Testing Operations, to discuss campus cases and tracking, actions taken to date, and next steps. Brielle Lonsberry, Student Body President for Georgia Tech Undergraduate SGA will moderate our townhall Q&A.

Everyone is welcome! Join via BlueJeans Events. Open Q&A will follow the team's presentations. A video recap of this talk will be posted to cos.gatech.edu and @gtsciences social channels.

This talk is hosted by the School of Biological Sciences at Georgia Tech.

Dragonfly: In Situ Exploration of Titan’s Organic Chemistry and Habitability

Georgia Tech's Center for Space Technology and Research (C-STAR) hosts Titan Week, featuring days of virtual fun on Saturn's spectacular, intriguing moon, and NASA's plans to explore it. 

At 6:30 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 19, CSTAR hosts Dr. Elizabeth Turtle, a planetary scientist at Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory, for its 2020 Distinguished Lecture. This year's virtual version will be via BlueJeans. 

Turtle is the principal investigator for NASA's Dragonfly mission, which proposes to use a rotorcraft lander to explore the environment of Titan.

NASA's Dragonfly New Frontiers mission is a rotorcraft lander designed to perform wide- ranging in situ investigation of the chemistry and habitability of this fascinating extraterrestrial environment. Taking advantage of Titan's dense atmosphere and low gravity, Dragonfly can fly from place to place, exploring diverse geological settings to measure the compositions of surface materials and observe Titan's geology and meteorology. Dragonfly will make multidisciplinary science measurements at dozens of sites, traveling 150 km during a three-year mission to characterize Titan's habitability and determine how far organic chemistry has progressed in environments that provide key ingredients for life.

Registration and other information for the 2020 Distinguished Lecture can be found here.

About Elizabeth Turtle

Dr. Elizabeth Turtle is a planetary scientist at Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory. Her research focus is using remote sensing observations and numerical geophysical models to study geological structures and their implications for the surfaces and interiors of the planets on which they formed. The processes of interest include impact cratering and tectonics on terrestrial planets and outer planet icy satellites, mountain formation on Io, creep of ice-rich permafrost on Mars, and dynamics of lakes on Titan. Turtle is the Principal investigator of the Dragonfly mission to Titan and the Europa Imaging System  for NASA's upcoming Europa mission, an associate on the Cassini Imaging Science Subsystem and RADAR teams, and a co-investigator on the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera.