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06/18/2012

Put a Seismometer in Your Living Room

Douglas Smith

Back in the 1960s, Charlie Richter (PhD '28) installed a seismometer in his living room. Now, if you live in the Pasadena area, you can have one, too.

06/13/2012

NuSTAR Space Telescope Blasts Off

Marcus Woo

This morning, NASA's NuSTAR telescope was launched into the low-Earth orbit from which it will begin exploring the high-energy X-ray universe to uncover the secrets of black holes, the dense remnants of dead stars, energetic cosmic explosions, and even our very own sun.

Artist's concept of NuSTAR space telescope

06/11/2012

Caltech Graduate Student Wins DOE Fellowship for Computational Science

Kimm Fesenmaier

Caltech graduate student Melissa Yeung has been selected as one of 21 students nationally to receive a Department of Energy (DOE) Computational Science Graduate Fellowship. The honor covers up to four years of support for graduate studies in fields that focus on the use of high-performance computing technology to solve complex problems in science and engineering.

06/04/2012

Physicists Close in on a Rare Particle-Decay Process

Marcus Woo

Physicists have made the most sensitive measurements yet in a decades-long hunt for a hypothetical and rare process involving the radioactive decay of atomic nuclei.

05/31/2012

Caltech Astronomer Mike Brown Awarded Kavli Prize in Astrophysics

Marcus Woo

Mike Brown, the Richard and Barbara Rosenberg Professor and professor of planetary astronomy at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), has been named a co-winner of the 2012 Kavli Prize in Astrophysics for his efforts to understand the outer solar system—work that led to the demotion of Pluto.

05/22/2012

Solar Eclipse Dazzles at Caltech

Marcus Woo

Sunday evening's solar eclipse dazzled hundreds of sun gazers who gathered on Caltech's campus to watch the rare alignment, a partial annular "ring of fire" solar eclipse that wowed spectators around the world.

05/18/2012

Notes from the Back Row: "An Explosion of Explosions"

Douglas Smith

In his Watson Lecture given on April 25, Shri Kulkarni, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Professor of Astronomy and Planetary Science and the director of the Caltech Optical Observatories, described how Caltech's fully automated Palomar Transient Factory—Kulkarni calls it "Transients 'R' Us"—is revolutionizing how we explore the changing sky.

05/16/2012

NASA Lends Ultraviolet Space Telescope to Caltech

Marcus Woo

Caltech has taken over operation from NASA of the Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX), a space telescope that for the last nine years has been surveying the cosmos in ultraviolet light.

05/11/2012

Overactive Black Holes Shut Down Star Formation

Marcus Woo

A team of astronomers has found that the most active galactic nuclei—enormous black holes that are violently devouring gas and dust at the centers of galaxies—may prevent new stars from forming.

04/30/2012

Notes from the Back Row: "Electrons In Flatland"

Douglas Smith

In James Eisenstein's Watson lecture on January 18, 2012, he uses vivid analogies and nifty animations to lead us through the basics of quantum electronics to his own work with some very bizarre particles—even for quantum mechanics.

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