UCSC Professor Enrico Ramirez-Ruiz has been a Fellow at
the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Harvard University this past
academic year and has graciously accepted our invitation to talk to the
BSLUGS. Please come to another fabulous
evening for UCSC alumni in West Newton where we’ll learn a lot, indulge in
delicious dessert, and meet old and new friends. As always, all friends and family are welcome!
Turning Stars into Gold
Most beginning chemistry students struggling with the
complexities and underlying structure of the Periodic Table will simply accept
the existence of the approximately 90 stable elements. Rarely does it occur to
them that somewhere and in some way, all of the elements had to be synthesized.
Such element generation or nucleosynthesis, through transmutation of one
element into another, is a crucial byproduct of stellar energy generation. It
has occurred since the birth of the first stars in the Galaxy, and without it
life on Earth would not be possible. Although the general picture of element
formation is well understood, many questions about the nuclear physics processes
and particularly the astrophysical details responsible for forming the heavier
elements such as platinum and gold remain to be answered. Here I focus on
advances in our understanding—still very incomplete— of the origin of the
heaviest and rarest elements in the Universe.
WHEN: Saturday, April 18
7:30-10 p.m. (7:30 p.m. dessert | 8:15 p.m. talk begins)
WHERE: At the home of Sloan Nota and Rob McKean in Newtonville, Mass. 02460
WHAT: a fascinating
talk, interesting discussion with fellow UCSC alums, and delightful dessert
RSVP to the BSLUG Facebook Event invitation or by email to
Beata (beata Panagopoulos verizon.net) by Monday, April 23
Enrico Ramirez-Ruiz is a Professor of Astronomy and
Astrophysics at the University of California, Santa Cruz (UCSC). He is also the
Director of the Theoretical Astrophysics Santa Cruz Institute and the Sophie
and Tycho Brahe Visiting Professor at the Niels Bohr Institute. After studying
at the University of Cambridge, he was the John Bahcall Fellow at the Institute
for Advanced Study in Princeton. Since joining the UCSC faculty, Ramirez-Ruiz
has won a number of national awards for his research, including a Packard
Fellowship for Science and Engineering
and the National Science Foundation CAREER Award. He is also a highly
regarded teacher and public lecturer. In 2010, he was elected a member of the
Mexican Academy of Sciences. Then 35, he was the youngest scientist ever
elected to the academy.
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