Special Events

Upcoming Events

Maui Maikalani Community Lecture: Dr. Bob Joseph, "Galileo and the 400th Anniversary of  Astronomy Using Telescopes," at 6:30 p.m. at the Maikalani building in Pukalani. Free. Flyer.

This year is the 400th anniversary of the first use of the telescope for astronomy. Galileo made several discoveries with the telescope that undercut the classical geocentric cosmology inherited from the Greeks. Because Aristotelean thought was the core of the university curriculum, as well as part of the Scholastic synthesis with Christian theology, this got Galileo into some trouble with his academic colleagues as well the Church. In this talk Dr. Joseph will describe some of Galileo's discoveries with his telescope and also discuss a bit about Galileo's scientific style and his confrontation with the Roman Inquisition. In the course of the discussion, he hopes to dispel some of the popular myths about Galileo and his encounter with the Inquisition.

Look Up!
An Evening of Sky Viewing

6–8 p.m., Hamilton Library Lawn, University of Hawaii at Manoa

Join us for this special IYA2009 star party, hot chocolate, and a peppermint candy cane!
Celebrate the International Year of Astronomy 2009 [IYA2009] with the Institute for Astronomy and the UHM Library.
View the wonders of the heavens as dusk turns to dark – the moon, planets and stars – as revealed by Institute for Astronomy [IfA] telescopes.
Visit the Hamilton Library Bridge Gallery to see the exhibit
The Universe: Yours to Discover!

Free campus parking  

Flyer

IYA 2009 Lecture: "Hubble Space Telescope: Past, Present & Future," IfA astronomer Lisa Kewley, 3:30 in Hamilton Library, room 301, free.

The Hubble Space Telescope (HST) has made a great impact on our knowledge of the Universe, from planets in our solar system, to nearby stars, to extremely distant galaxies. Dr. Kewley will present an overview of the major discoveries made by the HST and will describe the research that the UH astronomers are conducting by combining data from HST with data from the largest ground-based telescopes on Mauna Kea. She will report on the present status of the HST, including the recent successful servicing mission, and will present the HST’s successor, the James Webb Space Telescope.

Earlier Events

This talk will center on the often strained relationship between modern astronomers and indigenous peoples with their sacred mountains. Examples from the Tahono O'odham, San Carlos Apache, and Zuni tribes will be presented. Finally, the situations on Maunakea and Haleakala will be presented.  

Frontiers of Astronomy Community Lecture: IfA astronomer Shadia Habbal, "The Magic of a Disappearing Sun." UH Manoa Art Building auditorium, 7:30 p.m. Free.

For a few fleeting minutes, once every year or so, the Moon intercepts the light from the Sun, creating a shadow band a few hundred kilometers wide on Earth. It is during this event, known as a total solar eclipse, that stars appear in broad daylight and the intricate beauty of the outer atmosphere of the Sun, or its corona, is revealed. These are precious moments to witness but also precious for making unique observations of the corona. This presentation will highlight the human and scientific achievements that accompany the advent of a total solar eclipse.

While new large telescopes garner much of the press coverage, mid-size telescopes (those with a primary mirror less than about 4 meters in diameter) continue to be major contributors to astronomical research. Dr. Tokunaga will highlight the research done with the 3.0-meter (9.8 ft) NASA IRTF, a telescope on Mauna Kea operated for NASA by the University of Hawaii and dedicated to planetary science and support of NASA space missions. He will also review the increase of telescope aperture from Galileo's time to the present, when telescopes as large as 30 meters are being planned.

Imagine a world so cold it has lakes and rivers of liquid natural gas, a landscape strewn with boulders of ice, and dunes made of dark, carbon-containing grains that have fallen like snow from an orange-colored sky. This is Titan, a satellite of Saturn. Nearby is the moon Enceladus with active ice volcanoes and a diaphanous ring of its own. These marvels were discovered by Cassini-Huygens, a joint European-US mission that is still exploring this fabulous planetary system. 

Maui Maikalani Community Lecture: Dan O'Gara, Superintendent of Halekala Division, IfA, "Laser Ranging at Haleakala Observatories, 1972 to the Present," at 6:30 p.m. on at the Maikalani building in Pukalani. Free. Flyer.