The Institute of Advanced Studies and the International Centre for Radio Astronomy
Research present a free public lecture
Our Galaxy, the Milky Way by Ken Freeman, Duffield Professor of Astronomy, Australian National University and 2010 Institute of Advanced
Studies Professor-at-Large
We live in a large spiral galaxy known as the Milky Way. Living
inside a galaxy in some ways helps us to understand it and in
other ways makes it more difficult. We have learned a lot about
what our Galaxy looks like, and we have a rudimentary idea of
how it was assembled from the gas and dark matter long ago.
But there is much that we do not know: recently a startling
new process was discovered which may threaten some of our
basic ideas.
In this lecture, Professor Freeman will discuss how our
understanding of the Milky Way has evolved from the early
20th century right up to the present time, and will look
forward to some of the likely discoveries of the future.
About Professor Freeman
Ken Freeman is Duffield Professor of Astronomy at the
Australian National University (Research School of Astronomy &
Astrophysics, Mount Stromlo Observatory) in Canberra.
This dazzling infrared image from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope
shows hundreds of thousands of stars crowded into the swirling core
of our spiral Milky Way galaxy. In visible-light pictures, this region
cannot be seen at all because dust lying between Earth and the
galactic center blocks our view.
He studied mathematics at The University of Western Australia
and theoretical astrophysics at the University of Cambridge,
followed by a postdoctoral year at the University of Texas and
a year as a fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. He returned to
Australia in 1967 as a Queen Elizabeth II Fellow at Mt Stromlo
Observatory, and has been there ever since.
Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/S. Stolovy (SSC/Caltech)
His research interests are in the formation and dynamics of
galaxies and globular clusters, and particularly in the problem
of dark matter in galaxies: he was one of the first to point
out (1970) that spiral galaxies contain a large fraction of dark
matter.
When: Thursday, 12 August 2010
Lecture Details
Time: 6pm
Venue: Social Sciences Lecture Theatre, UWA
The nearest car park is P3 off Hackett Entrance 1.
For his current research, he uses optical and radio telescopes
in Australia and the USA, and also observes with the Hubble
Space Telescope and large optical telescopes in Spain, Chile,
and Hawaii. He has written about 750 research articles, and a
book on dark matter, and was named by ISI in 2001 as one of
Australia’s most highly cited scientists.
Institute of Advanced Studies
This lecture is co-sponsored with
the International Centre for Radio
Astronomy Research (ICRAR).
The University of Western Australia
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