Webinar: Extraterrestrial Life
Are We the Sharpest Cookies in the Jar?

The search for extraterrestrial life is one of the most exciting frontiers in Astronomy. First tentative clues were identified close to Earth in the form of the weird interstellar object Oumuamua. Our civilization will mature once we find out who resides on our cosmic street by searching with our best telescopes for unusual electromagnetic flashes, industrial pollution of planetary atmospheres, artificial light or heat, artificial space debris or something completely unexpected. We might be a form of life as primitive and common in the cosmos as ants are in a kitchen. If so, we can learn a lot from others out there through the new frontier of "space archaeology".

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Brought to you by CERN Colloquium
Presented by Prof. Avi Loeb (Professor of Science at Harvard University)
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The Mars 2020 Perseverance Rover Mission in Jezero Crater, Mars
by Dr Jesse Tarnas (NASA, Jet Propulsion Laboratory)

In February 2021, NASA’s Mars 2020 Perseverance rover landed in Jezero crater, the site of an ancient lake. The mission seeks to discover signs of ancient martian life, and will collect rock, soil, and atmospheric samples for possible return to Earth. Perseverance and its field partner—the Ingenuity helicopter—have been actively exploring Jezero crater for several months, successfully coring the mission’s first rock sample. Multiple distinct geologic units have been characterized through these investigations, each containing information about the environmental history, habitability, and planetary evolution of Mars. Here I will cover the technological achievements and scientific discoveries of NASA’s Mars 2020 Perseverance Rover Mission, as well as their implications for astrobiology, planetary science, and space exploration.

Webinar recording
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Neil deGrasse Tyson Explains Horsepower

What is horsepower? On this explainer, Neil deGrasse Tyson and comic co-host Chuck Nice break down what horsepower means a unit of measure, and where it comes from. Could we measure explosions in terms of Death Stars?

We hop in our horseless carriages and take a ride down what it means for something to have horsepower. We break down engines and the different metrics used to measure their power. What about watts? How much horsepower does a NASA shuttle rocket engine have? What would it take to get millions of horses to run fast enough to get into orbit? We discuss how the power of atomic bombs and hydrogen bombs are quantified. Exploding horses? Death Stars? All that and more, on another StarTalk explainer!

Video | Stream on YouTube
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Can YOU Fix Climate Change?

Never before in human history have we been richer, more advanced or powerful. And yet we feel overwhelmed in the face of rapid climate change. It seems simple on the surface. Greenhouse gases trap energy from the Sun and transfer it to our atmosphere. This leads to warmer winters, harsher summers. Dry places become drier and wet places wetter. Countless ecosystems will die while the rising oceans swallow coasts and the cities we build on them.

So why don’t we just like… prevent all of that? Well, it’s complicated.

Video (Kurzgesagt) | Stream on YouTube
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