Mapping the Origins of the Universe

February 16, 2021
6:00 pm – 7:15 pm

Facebook Live and C2ST YouTube TV

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Program Series:
Physical ScienceTechnology and Engineering

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Join C2ST as we connect with researchers LIVE from the NSF-funded telescope projects in the South Pole and Chile to unlock some great mysteries to the origin of the cosmos. 

Connect live with Bradford Benson Ph.D., Jo Dunkley Ph.D., Alysha Shugart M.S., and Cyndia Yu, a Ph.D. student in Physics, on the progress of the research conducted by the teams researching both the South Pole and Chilean telescopes. The discussion will range from climate selection criteria to the experiences of the people collecting the data in the field, including their background, what inspired them to pursue a STEM career, and what they hope to do next!

Event Details

Tuesday, February 16th, 2020, 6:00-7:15 pm CT, C2ST Facebook Live & C2ST TV Youtube Live.

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Featured Guests

Bradford Bensen, Ph.D.

Dr. Bradford Benson is a Scientist at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, an Associate Professor in the Department of Astronomy & Astrophysics at the University of Chicago, and a senior member of the Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics (KICP). Dr. Benson is an experimental cosmologist, who studies the cosmic microwave background: the relic radiation from the very early Universe, which was emitted only 380,000 years after the Big Bang. His research takes him to the very ends of the Earth, namely the South Pole, where he builds instruments for the South Pole Telescope, which aims to answer some of the biggest questions in cosmology: What physics was responsible for the Big Bang?  What is the Universe made of?  What is Dark Energy? He is a co-recipient of the 2020 Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics, for being part of the large team of scientists responsible for taking the first picture of the shadow around a supermassive black hole, as part of the Event Horizon Telescope collaboration. Dr. Benson received his Ph.D. in Physics from Stanford University in 2004 and his undergraduate degree from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, before doing postdoctoral research at the University of California-Berkeley and the University of Chicago.

 

Jo Dunkley, Ph.D.

Dr. Jo Dunkley is a Professor of Physics and Astrophysical Sciences at Princeton University. She researches cosmology; studying the origins and evolution of the Universe. Her major projects are the Atacama Cosmology Telescope and the Simons Observatory. She is a member of the Rubin Observatory’s Dark Energy Science Collaboration and was awarded the Maxwell Medal, the Rosalind Franklin Award, and the New Horizons prize for work on the Cosmic Microwave Background, and shared the Gruber Prize and the Breakthrough Prize with the WMAP team.  

Alysha Shugart

Alysha Shugart is the newest (and first) Observations Specialist at the Vera C. Rubin Observatory. Before joining the Rubin team, Alysha served Gemini South International Observatory as a science operations specialist and diversity advocate for the AURA centers in Chile. During her time as a diversity advocate, Alysha worked to bring different perspectives into light in the organization, including local Chilean D&I activists, lawmakers, anthropologists, and poets to create a culture of a shared appreciation for diversity in thought. Alysha has also collaborated to introduce more inclusive policies and a DEI network into NSF’s NOIRlab and AURA. She began working in observatory operations at McDonald Observatory in West Texas and has more than 13 years working on telescopes in the United States and Chile. She has contributed to optical instrument building and testing at both Apache Point and McDonald Observatories. She also works on galactic merger research with data taken on the Gemini Multi-Conjugate Adaptive Optics System (GeMS). 

Cyndia Yu

Cyndia Yu is a Ph.D. student in physics at Stanford, where she works on building new tools to study the astroparticle universe. She is involved in cosmic microwave background experiments around the world, including the BICEP/Keck experiment series, the South Pole Observatory, the Simons Observatory, and CMB-S4, where her work ranges from designing and testing new detector systems to analyzing pictures of the oldest light in the Universe. As a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow and Stanford Enhancing Diversity in Graduate Education Fellow, outside of the lab, she is committed to building a more equitable and just physics community and communicating the joys of science to the broader public.