Bright Galaxies Dark Matter And Beyond

How Vera Rubin convinced the scientific community that dark matter might exist, persevering despite early dismissals of her work. We now know that the universe is mostly dark, made up of particles and forces that are undetectable even by our most powerful telescopes. The discovery of the possible existence of dark matter and dark energy signaled a Copernican-like revolution in astronomy: not only are we not the center of the universe, neither is the stuff of which we’re made. Astronomer Vera Rubin (1928–2016) played a pivotal role in this discovery. By showing that some astronomical objects seem to defy gravity’s grip, Rubin helped convince the scientific community of the possibility of dark matter. In Bright Galaxies, Dark Matter, and Beyond, Ashley Jean Yeager tells the story of Rubin’s life and work, recounting her persistence despite early dismissals of her work and widespread sexism in science. Yeager describes Rubin’s childhood fascination with stars, her education at Vassar and Cornell, and her marriage to a fellow scientist. At first, Rubin wasn’t taken seriously; she was a rarity, a woman in science, and her findings seemed almost incredible. Some observatories in midcentury America restricted women from using their large telescopes; Rubin was unable to collect her own data until a decade after she had earned her PhD. Still, she continued her groundbreaking work, driving a scientific revolution. She received the National Medal of Science in 1993, but never the Nobel Prize—perhaps overlooked because of her gender. She’s since been memorialized with a ridge on Mars, an asteroid, a galaxy, and most recently, the Vera C. Rubin Observatory—the first national observatory named after a woman.

In 1965, Vera Rubin was the first woman permitted to observe at Palomar Observatory. In the intervening years, she has become one of the world's finest and most respected astronomers. This particular collection of essays is compiled from work written over the past 15 years and deals with a variety of subjects in astronomy and astrophysics, specifically galaxies and dark matter. The book also contains biographical sketches of astronomers who have been colleagues and friends, providing a stimulating view of a woman in science. About the Author Since 1965 Vera Rubin has been a staff member at the Department of Terrestrial Magnetism of the Carnegie Institution of Washington. Dr. Rubin has authored nearly 200 papers on the structure of our galaxy, motions within other galaxies, and large scale motions in the universe. She has been a distinguished visiting astronomer at the Cerro Tololo Inter American Observatory in Chile; a Chancellor's Distinguished Professor at the University of California, Berkeley; a President's Distinguished Visitor at Vassar College; and a Beatrice Tinsley visiting professor at the University of Texas, Austin.

How Vera Rubin convinced the scientific community that dark matter might exist, persevering despite early dismissals of her work. We now know that the universe is mostly dark, made up of particles and forces that are undetectable even by our most powerful telescopes. The discovery of the possible existence of dark matter and dark energy signaled a Copernican-like revolution in astronomy: not only are we not the center of the universe, neither is the stuff of which we’re made. Astronomer Vera Rubin (1928–2016) played a pivotal role in this discovery. By showing that some astronomical objects seem to defy gravity’s grip, Rubin helped convince the scientific community of the possibility of dark matter. In Bright Galaxies, Dark Matter, and Beyond, Ashley Jean Yeager tells the story of Rubin’s life and work, recounting her persistence despite early dismissals of her work and widespread sexism in science. Yeager describes Rubin’s childhood fascination with stars, her education at Vassar and Cornell, and her marriage to a fellow scientist. At first, Rubin wasn’t taken seriously; she was a rarity, a woman in science, and her findings seemed almost incredible. Some observatories in midcentury America restricted women from using their large telescopes; Rubin was unable to collect her own data until a decade after she had earned her PhD. Still, she continued her groundbreaking work, driving a scientific revolution. She received the National Medal of Science in 1993, but never the Nobel Prize—perhaps overlooked because of her gender. She’s since been memorialized with a ridge on Mars, an asteroid, a galaxy, and most recently, the Vera C. Rubin Observatory—the first national observatory named after a woman.

The first biography of a pioneering scientist who made significant contributions to our understanding of dark matter and championed the advancement of women in science. One of the great lingering mysteries of the universe is dark matter. Scientists are not sure what it is, but most believe it’s out there, and in abundance. The astronomer who finally convinced many of them was Vera Rubin. When Rubin died in 2016, she was regarded as one of the most influential astronomers of her era. Her research on the rotation of spiral galaxies was groundbreaking, and her observations contributed significantly to the confirmation of dark matter, a most notable achievement. In Vera Rubin: A Life, prolific science writers Jacqueline Mitton and Simon Mitton provide a detailed, accessible overview of Rubin’s work, showing how she leveraged immense curiosity, profound intelligence, and novel technologies to help transform our understanding of the cosmos. But Rubin’s impact was not limited to her contributions to scientific knowledge. She also helped to transform scientific practice by promoting the careers of women researchers. Not content to be an inspiration, Rubin was a mentor and a champion. She advocated for hiring women faculty, inviting women speakers to major conferences, and honoring women with awards that were historically the exclusive province of men. Rubin’s papers and correspondence yield vivid insights into her life and work, as she faced down gender discrimination and met the demands of family and research throughout a long and influential career. Deftly written, with both scientific experts and general readers in mind, Vera Rubin is a portrait of a woman with insatiable curiosity about the universe who never stopped asking questions and encouraging other women to do the same.

This book brings together reviews from leading international authorities on the developments in the study of dark matter and dark energy, as seen from both their cosmological and particle physics side. Studying the physical and astrophysical properties of the dark components of our Universe is a crucial step towards the ultimate goal of unveiling their nature. The work developed from a doctoral school sponsored by the Italian Society of General Relativity and Gravitation. The book starts with a concise introduction to the standard cosmological model, as well as with a presentation of the theory of linear perturbations around a homogeneous and isotropic background. It covers the particle physics and cosmological aspects of dark matter and (dynamical) dark energy, including a discussion of how modified theories of gravity could provide a possible candidate for dark energy. A detailed presentation is also given of the possible ways of testing the theory in terms of cosmic microwave background, galaxy redshift surveys and weak gravitational lensing observations. Included is a chapter reviewing extensively the direct and indirect methods of detection of the hypothetical dark matter particles. Also included is a self-contained introduction to the techniques and most important results of numerical (e.g. N-body) simulations in cosmology. " This volume will be useful to researchers, PhD and graduate students in Astrophysics, Cosmology Physics and Mathematics, who are interested in cosmology, dark matter and dark energy.

How a team of researchers, led by the author, discovered our home galaxy's location in the universe. You are here: on Earth, which is part of the solar system, which is in the Milky Way galaxy, which itself is within the extragalactic supercluster Laniakea. And how can we pinpoint our location so precisely? For twenty years, astrophysicist Hélène Courtois surfed the cosmos with international teams of researchers, working to map our local universe. In this book, Courtois describes this quest and the discovery of our home supercluster. Courtois explains that Laniakea (which means “immense heaven” in Hawaiian) is the largest galaxy structure known to which we belong; it is huge, almost too large to comprehend—about five hundred million light-years in diameter. It contains about 100,000 large galaxies like our own, and a million smaller ones. Writing accessibly for nonspecialists, Courtois describes the visualization and analysis that allowed her team to map such large structures of the universe. She highlights the work of individual researchers, including portraits of several exceptional women astrophysicists—presenting another side of astronomy. Key ideas are highlighted in text insets; illustrations accompany the main text. The French edition of this book was named the Best Astronomy Book of 2017 by the astronomy magazine Ciel et espace. For this MIT Press English-language edition, Courtois has added descriptions of discoveries made after Laniakea: the cosmic velocity web and the Dipole and Cold Spot repellers. An engaging account of one of the most important discoveries in astrophysics in recent years, her story is a tribute to teamwork and international collaboration.

How pioneering scientists at Palomar Observatory make dazzling discoveries of astronomical phenomena beyond human experience and imagination. Ever since 1936, pioneering scientists at Palomar Observatory in Southern California have pushed against the boundaries of the known universe, making a series of dazzling discoveries that changed our view of the cosmos: quasars, colliding galaxies, supermassive black holes, brown dwarfs, supernovae, dark matter, the never-ending expansion of the universe, and much more. In Cosmic Odyssey, astronomer Linda Schweizer tells the story of the men and women at Palomar and their efforts to decipher the vast energies and mysterious processes that govern our universe.

The life and work of Freeman Dyson—renowned scientist, visionary, and iconoclast—and his particular way of thinking about deep questions. Freeman Dyson (1923–2020)—renowned scientist, visionary, and iconoclast—helped invent modern physics. Not bound by disciplinary divisions, he went on to explore foundational topics in mathematics, astrophysics, and the origin of life. General readers were introduced to Dyson’s roving mind and heterodox approach in his 1979 book Disturbing the Universe, a poignant autobiographical reflection on life and science. “Well, Doc, You’re In” (the title quotes Richard Feynman’s remark to Dyson at a physics conference) offers a fresh examination of Dyson’s life and work, exploring his particular way of thinking about deep questions that range from the nature of matter to the ultimate fate of the universe. The chapters—written by leading scientists, historians, and science journalists, including some of Dyson’s colleagues—trace Dyson’s formative years, his budding interests and curiosities, and his wide-ranging work across the natural sciences, technology, and public policy. They describe Dyson’s innovations at the intersection of quantum theory and relativity, his novel nuclear reactor design (and his never-realized idea of a spacecraft powered by nuclear weapons), his years at the Institute for Advanced Study, and his foray into cosmology. In the coda, Dyson’s daughter Esther reflects on growing up in the Dyson household. “Well, Doc, You’re In” assesses Dyson’s successes, blind spots, and influence, assembling a portrait of a scientist’s outsized legacy. Contributors Jeremy Bernstein, Robbert Dijkgraaf, Esther Dyson, George Dyson, Ann Finkbeiner, Amanda Gefter, Ashutosh Jogalekar, David Kaiser, Caleb Scharf, William Thomas

A memoir of MIT life, from being Noam Chomsky's boss to negotiating with student protesters. When Jay Keyser arrived at MIT in 1977 to head the Department of Linguistics and Philosophy, he writes, he "felt like a fish that had been introduced to water for the first time." At MIT, a colleague grabbed him by the lapels to discuss dark matter; Noam Chomsky called him "boss" (double SOB spelled backward?); and engaging in conflict resolution made him feel like "a marriage counselor trying to reconcile a union between a Jehovah's witness and a vampire." In Mens et Mania, Keyser recounts his academic and administrative adventures during a career of more than thirty years. Keyser describes the administrative side of his MIT life, not only as department head but also as Associate Provost and Special Assistant to the Chancellor. Keyser had to run a department ("budgets were like horoscopes") and negotiate student grievances—from the legality of showing Deep Throat in a dormitory to the uproar caused by the arrests of students for anti-apartheid demonstrations. Keyser also describes a visiting Japanese delegation horrified by the disrepair of the linguistics department offices (Chomsky tells them "Our motto is: Physically shabby. Intellectually first class."); convincing a student not to jump off the roof of the Green Building; and recent attempts to look at MIT through a corporate lens. And he explains the special faculty-student bond at MIT: the faculty sees the students as themselves thirty years earlier. Keyser observes that MIT is hard to get into and even harder to leave, for faculty as well as for students. Writing about retirement, Keyser quotes the song Groucho Marx sang in Animal Crackers as he was leaving a party—"Hello, I must be going." Students famously say "Tech is hell." Keyser says,"It's been a helluva party." This entertaining and thought-provoking memoir will make readers glad that Keyser hasn't quite left.

The astronomer’s observing chair as both image and object, and the story it tells about a particular kind of science and a particular view of history. The astronomer’s chair is a leitmotif in the history of astronomy, appearing in hundreds of drawings, prints, and photographs from a variety of sources. Nineteenth-century stargazers in particular seemed eager to display their observing chairs—task-specific, often mechanically adjustable observatory furniture designed for use in conjunction with telescopes. But what message did they mean to send with these images? In The Astronomer’s Chair, Omar W. Nasim considers these specialized chairs as both image and object, offering an original framework for linking visual and material cultures. Observing chairs, Nasim ingeniously argues, showcased and embodied forms of scientific labor, personae, and bodily practice that appealed to bourgeois sensibilities. Viewing image and object as connected parts of moral, epistemic, and visual economies of empire, Nasim shows that nineteenth-century science was represented in terms of comfort and energy, and that “manly” postures of Western astronomers at work in specialized chairs were contrasted pointedly with images of “effete” and cross-legged “Oriental” astronomers. Extending his historical analysis into the twentieth century, Nasim reexamines what he argues to be a famous descendant of the astronomer’s chair: Freud’s psychoanalytic couch, which directed observations not outward toward the stars but inward toward the stratified universe of the psyche. But whether in conjunction with the mind or the heavens, the observing chair was a point of entry designed for specialists that also portrayed widely held assumptions about who merited epistemic access to these realms in the first place. With more than 100 illustrations, many in color; flexibound.