Events/Announcements

The Conference for Undergraduate Women in Astronomy (CUWiA) will be held at West Virginia University on November 1-3, 2019.

CUWiA has been formed to celebrate the women in Astronomy in West Virginia and beyond. The idea for CUWiA came about while organizers Olivia Young and Erica Chwalik were attending the 2018 APS Conference for Undergraduate Women in Physics (CUWiP) . Their experience was such a positive one that it set the idea in motion to start CUWiA to bring women in astronomy together to learn about research and explore career and graduate opportunities. 

"Making Contact" is an examination of the science behind the search for extraterrestrial intelligence and the life of its pioneer, Jill Tarter, the inspiration for the main character in Carl Sagan's "Contact." 

Are we alone? Humans have been asking this question throughout history. We want to know where we came from, how we fit into the cosmos and where we are going. We want to know whether there is life beyond the Earth and whether any of it is intelligent. 

Since the middle of the 20th century we have had tools that permit us to embark on a scientific exploration to try to answer this old question. We no longer have to ask the priests and philosophers what we should believe about extraterrestrial life; we can explore and discover what’s actually out there. Our tools are getting ever better. We have discovered extremophiles in the most unexpected places on this planet, and we have discovered that there really are far more planets than stars out there. We haven’t yet found life beyond Earth, but there is a vast amount of potentially-habitable real estate to explore. The 21st century will be the century in which we will find some answers to this old question; there are many paths we will investigate.  

Dr. Joan Centrella of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center will be presenting a public lecture on Wednesday, April 25, 2018, at 7 pm in G-09 White Hall on the downtown WVU campus.  

 The title of the talk is Frontiers of Astrophysics:  How Discoveries Can Change Our Lives.  The frontiers of astrophysics are driven forward by the power of ideas and discoveries.  The lecture will focus on three exciting areas: the search for exoplanets and life in the universe; revealing the dark side of the universe with gravitational waves; and probing farther back in time with new telescopes.  In addition to the scientific achievements, Dr. Centrella will also discuss how knowledge from these areas of astrophysics can impact how we think and live.

Sarah Kendrew, an astronomer and instrument scientist at the European Space Agency, will give a talk on “The Giant Telescopes of the Future” on Friday, March 2 at 7 p.m. in G09 White Hall. 

She will discuss the James Webb Space Telescope, which is NASA, ESA and the Canadian Space Agency’s flagship infrared space mission for the next decade. Scheduled for launch in spring 2019, the telescope and spacecraft are now in the final stages of integration and testing. She will present an overview of the mission status and of the capabilities of the telescope’s instrumentation and discuss other giant telescopes planned for future launches.

Dr. Sarah Kendrew from the Space Telescope Science Institute is employed by the European Space Agency and is an instrument scientist for the mid-infrared spectrometer on JWST.  She will lead a workshop on proposing tools for JWST. This will be targeted specifically at astronomers.