Two world class astronomers from the McDonald Observatory, near Fort Davis, Texas, will be on the Hardin-Simmons University campus on Friday to speak about the Davis Mountains’ observatory and some of the incredible findings made using the world’s third largest telescope, the Hobby-Eberly Telescope.
“This is a rare opportunity for HSU students and faculty,” says HSU professor of mathematics and founder of the International Asteroid Search Collaboration, Dr. Patrick Miller.
Dr. David Lambert, director of the McDonald Observatory, and Dr. Karl Gebhardt, esteemed Joan Suit Professor of Astrophysics, both professors at University of Texas, Austin, will speak in HSU’s Holland Science Building, Friday, January 25, 2013, 1-2 p.m., room 220.
They will give a general talk on astronomy plus present the recent findings made at the McDonald Observatory. One of these findings, from November 2012, is the largest black hole ever discovered in the universe. “This object weighs as much as 17 billion Suns, and is located in the distant galaxy NGC 1277, found 220 million light years from Earth,” says Miller.
Miller says, “This is an opportunity for the community, HSU students, and HSU faculty and staff to meet these world-famous astronomers, and hear them describe the most recent discoveries made at the McDonald Observatory.”
Image:
Artist's concept of what a future telescope might see in looking at a black hole at the heart of a galaxy. Clumpy gas swirls around the black hole in an accretion disk, feeding the central beast. The black area at center is the black hole itself, defined by the event horizon, beyond which nothing can escape. The bright blue jet shooting from the region of the black hole is created by gas that never made it into the hole itself but was instead funneled into a very energetic jet. Credit: Gemini Observatory/AURA illustration by Lynette Cook
Photo: Dr. Karl Gebhardt, Herman and Joan Suit Professor of Astrophysics at The University of Texas at Austin. Credit: McDonald Observatory/UT-Austin