About this Event
Some 14 billion years ago, the universe was exceedingly smooth. Today’s universe is populated by >200 billion galaxies that span an astounding range of shapes, sizes and “colours” and which are arranged in thin twisting filaments millions of lightyears long. Explaining how galaxies formed, their arrangement and why they are so diverse has absorbed astrophysicists for nearly a century. Leveraging some of the world’s most powerful supercomputers, today we stand at the threshold of a comprehensive model for the emergence of cosmic structure. In this talk, I will highlight this effort’s successes; note outstanding challenges; and speak to some surprising outcomes – like the realization that galaxies “breathe, exchanging gas and energy with their surroundings, and are products of “nature versus nurture” competition playing out over cosmic time.
Dr. Arif Babul is a Distinguished Professor at the University of Victoria in Canada. He received his PhD from Princeton University in 1989. He is a recipient of several prestigious awards for his significant contributions to the study of cosmic structure, including galaxy formation. Most notably, early in his career, he held a NATO Science Fellowship at the University of Cambridge and was elected U.S. National Academy of Science Kavli Fellow. He was recently elected Fellow of the American Physical Society, and he currently holds both the prestigious Infosys Visiting Chair Professorship at the Indian Institute for Science and a Leverhulme Visiting Professorship at the University of Edinburgh.
Refreshments will be served from 6:00pm.
Event Venue & Nearby Stays
University of Central Lancashire, Darwin Lecture Theatre., Fylde Road, Preston, United Kingdom
GBP 0.00
