Evento

A Conversation with the Stars

The Milky Way today weighs about one trillion Suns, of which only a fraction of that - about a few ten billion or so Suns - are the visible matter that you know and love: stars, gas, planets, us, etc. So, um. What's up with that? How did we get to where we now are over the course of 13.8 billion years that the Universe has been in existence?

Matt Orr, graduating Ph.D. candidate at the California Institute of technology (and a native of La Canada Flintridge!), will explore with you the ways in which galaxies like the Milky Way grow; from quiescent star formation to massive violent mergers of galaxies. It's really neat stuff, so don't miss this chance! You'll also get a sneak peak into how bad galaxies are at their one job (making stars), and how often small galaxies fall into our own galaxy.

Matt Orr attended La Canada High School (Go Spartans!), before receiving a B.S. in Physics from the University of Southern California in 2014 (Yay Trojans!). He is a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow, studying how galaxies like our own Milky Way form their stars and evolve through cosmic time, using simulations and theory. In his free time, he enjoys woodworking and the poetry of the great scotsman Robert Burns (which I guess means this talk should have been scheduled in January...och well)!