Funding for space science is overwhelmingly provided by government—a product of public policy. Scientists have the ability and the opportunity to participate in the process of setting public policy through both direct and indirect means, such as supporting lobbying efforts by professional scientific organizations. The Planetary Society, a rare example of an independent pro-space nonprofit, actively engages in the process of policy development, working to support space science and exploration investment by the U.S. government. This talk will discuss why space policy is important and how future scientists can be effective space advocates for themselves and their field,
Casey Dreier,
Chief Advocate & Senior Space Policy Adviser The Planetary Society
We are excited to present the latest information on our Explorigins colloquium this week as part of Space Science Week @ Tech! See the flyer and schedule below for additional information and a detailed schedule.
Watch party for the landing of the Perserverance rover on Mars, co-hosted with CSTAR
Note: This event has separate registration.
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Plenary Speaker: Prof. Lisa Yaszek
Talk Title: A Brief History of Astrobiology Science Fiction, 5BCE–Present
Abstract: In this talk, Regents Professor of Science Fiction Studies Dr. Lisa Yaszek demonstrates how science fiction artists anticipate, dramatize, and extend our ideas about astrobiology. After briefly reviewing astrobiology themes in ancient and medieval world literature, Dr. Yaszek explores three aspects of this discipline that fascinate modern scientists and speculative artists alike: exobiology, the origins of life, and planetary habitability. She concludes by considering the increasingly global and self-reflexive nature of recent astrobiology stories across media.
Bio: Lisa Yaszek is Regents’ Professor of Science Fiction Studies in the School of Literature, Media, and Communication at Georgia Tech. Her books include Galactic Suburbia: Recovering Women’s Science Fiction (Ohio State, 2008); Sisters of Tomorrow: The First Women of Science Fiction (Wesleyan 2016); and Literary Afrofuturism in the Twenty-FirstCentury (co-edited with Isiah Lavender III, Ohio State, 2020). Yaszek ideas have been featured in The Washington Post, Food and Wine Magazine, and USA Today, and she has been an expert commentator for the BBC4’s Stranger Than Sci Fi, Wired.com’s Geek’s Guide to the Galaxy, and the AMC miniseries James Cameron’s Story of Science Fiction. A past president of the Science Fiction Research Association, Yaszek currently serves as a juror for the John W. Campbell and Eugie Foster Science Fiction Awards.
Welcome to Space Science week at Georgia Tech! Georgia Tech’s Center for Space Tecnology and Research and the ExplOrigins team–our GT Early career Astrobiology community–are teaming up to bring you a fantastic week of events and information about the Red Planet, and the history and exploration of our solar system. We’re excited to showcase some of the exciting work being done here at Tech, and help celebrate the landing of NASA’s Perseverance Rover on Mars this Thursday! Each day, we’ll send out some Mars Minutes to help you get informed and excited for the big events this Wednesday through Friday. The schedule follows below.
Today’s Mars Minute is a rundown of the Mars 2020 mission and the Perseverance Rove Every two years, the orbits are right to send a mission to Mars. With the Mars 2020 mission, the goal is to start the ambitious Mars Sample Return program. The Mars 2020 Perseverance Rover will search for signs of ancient microbial life, which will advance NASA’s quest to explore the past habitability of Mars. The rover has a drill to collect core samples of Martian rock and soil, then store them in sealed tubes for pickup by a future mission that would ferry them back to Earth for detailed analysis. Perseverance will also test technologies to help pave the way for future human exploration of Mars. Strapped to the rover’s belly for the journey to Mars is a technology demonstration — the Mars Helicopter, Ingenuity, may achieve a “Wright Brothers moment “ by testing the first powered flight on the Red Planet.
The talk will provide an overview of the Mars 2020 mission and the Perseverance rover with a particular focus on what grains can tell us about geology of Mars.
Picture description: Oblique view of Jezero crater, landing site of Perseverance
The exploration of outer space, and specifically, the astrobiological search for evidence of life, is an endeavor and a science that is made powerful because of its multidisciplinarity. From the NASA HQ archives to the Atacama Desert to (working from home) at NASA Ames to countless conferences, I have had the phenomenal opportunity to see science in action and the creative and critical ways in which scientists engage with the fundamental questions posed by astrobiology. For this talk, I will share stories and data from my ongoing dissertation research in anthropology, outlining the methodological strategies I employ and demonstrating the insights I draw from ethnographic encounters. Based on this, I will share a few lessons learned from over a year of fieldwork and some preliminary conclusions.
Spring 2021 Seminal Papers in Astrobiology schedule is now finalized! Guests, we welcome you to sit in on the presentations and discussions. Because this is a course with participation points given for students taking it for a grade, guests are asked to please reserve questions/comments until the end of the discussion period. Course meetings are Wednesdays 9:30-11:25 am Eastern on Blue Jeans: https://gatech.bluejeans.com/891027890
