Astronomy Ireland Public Lecture
" Pulsars "
By Dr Andy Shearer, Centre for Astronomy, NUI Galway.
Monday 8 November 2010 at 8:00pm
Trinity College, Dublin
About the Lecture
Pulsars – rapidly rotating neutron stars were first discovered in 1968 by the Irish PhD student Jocelyn Bell then working at Cambridge University. Since then nearly 2000 have been discovered, primarily as radio pulsars but also a X-ray, optical and gamma ray objects. Most (all?) pulsars are thought to come from Type II supernovae when a massive star at least 8 times bigger than the sun ends its life in a massive explosion. The resulting neutron star is small, diameter about 20-30 kilometres; has a large magnetic field filed strengths up to more than a thousand billion times the earth's magnetic field and very dense – one teaspoon of neutron star material would be more massive than all the water in Galway bay.
Although we have known about pulsars for over forty years we still do not know how they work. In Galway we have approached this problem through optical observations using our own cameras and computer simulations. In the talk I will give background information about what pulsars are, why they are important and the current state of our understanding, including recent radio and gamma ray observations as well as our own work in Galway.
The Speaker - Dr. Andy Shearer
Dr Andy Shearer graduated from London University with a BSc in Astronomy in 1975. He subsequently obtained an MSc(1978) and PhD(1980) in Cosmic Ray Physics from Durham University. He worked as a post-doc in Bristol University and in Industry before taking up a research position in Experimental Physics department University College Galway in 1991. In 1996 he was appointed as a lecturer in the Information Technology Department at the renamed National University of Ireland, Galway. In 2005 he founded the Irish Centre for High-End Computing (ICHEC) and was its first Director. His research interests cover high-performance computing, grid computing, medical and astronomical imaging processing, modelling astrophysical plasmas and high-time resolution astronomical observations. He has a specific interest in optical observations of rotation-powered pulsars. His group is credited with the discovery of optical pulsations from two out of the five of the known optical pulsars. He is currently working on optical follow on studies of pulsars discovered by the Fermi Gamma-Ray Satellite. He is currently the Director of the Centre of Astronomy, NUI, Galway.Research Interests
- Astrophysics: Optical Pulsars - Observations, Data Analysis and Modelling
- Medical Imaging: Enhancement of Medical X-Rays / Segmentation
- Imaging: Development of Parallel Image Deconvolution systems
- Grid/Meta Computing
Booking Information
| Date | Monday 8th November |
| Time | 8:00 p.m. |
| Venue |
Schrodinger Theatre, Fitzgerald Building, Trinity College Dublin Access can be gained via the Westland Row or Lincoln Place entrances. Click HERE for a building map of Trinity College campus Click HERE for Directions. Click HERE for Map of area |
| Admission | €7 (€5 Astronomy Ireland members and concessions) Places MUST be booked in advance |
| Booking |
Click HERE to book seats online.
Call (01) 847 0777 to book tickets over the phone using Debit/ Credit Card Send a cheque/ PO/ Draft, made payable to Astronomy Ireland to PO BOX 2888, Dublin 5. |
DVD
|
This lecture is also available to members nationwide on DVD.
To order a copy of the DVD simply: Order by credit/ debit card online HERE Call (01) 847 0777 Alternatively post a Cheque or postal order to: July 2010 DVD, Astronomy Ireland, PO. Box 2888, Dublin 5. Cost: DVD’s cost €7 each (add €5 for P&P for any number of DVDs) |
After the lecture there will be a social reception in The Lombard
and we encourage all of you to come along and have a chat with Dr. Shearer.
All are welcome to attend and food will be kindly provided by The Lombard.
Acknowledgment: Astronomy Ireland would like to thank the TCD Astrophysics Research Group for hosting AI public lectures in Trinity College Dublin.
