Tuesday, July 22, 2008

cincinnati radio show!

my trip to UC last week was very nice. they kindly took me to an indian restaurant for lunch and then i sat in a room with the astronomy undergraduate students and talked about their research projects until the time came to give my talk. it's neat to see so many undergrad students interested in astronomy at UC: when i was there, i was the only one! here's a picture from way back then...


the talk went well i thought. i received a lot of questions from the physicists who have more recently become interested in astronomy. i tried to skip some of the details of methodology i use to derive quantities, like morphologies of galaxies, but of course attentive listeners jump right on what you don't tell them and ask anyway!

after the talk, one of the newer astronomy students, davin, mentioned to me that he's read this blog before! i was surprised and flattered and even more excited to find out that he hosts a science-y radio show on a local station - WAIF 88.3! i gladly accepted his invitation to do an hour interview this wednesday from 1-2pm EST, so tune in if you have the time and interest!

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yes, but did you go to a Graeter's?

Unknown said...

i've satisfied my skyline chili craving, but i havent made it to larosa's or graeter's....

heroineworshipper said...

Composite spectra of quasar sub-classes in the SDSS was no match for sleeping in my undergrad years. Now to figure out whether to take the dumpy apartment or dumpier apartment.

Steve Jeffery said...

Ah, that'll be a presentation poster. A friend of mine has recently completed her PhD, and she's told me tales of attending conferences armed with ginormous poster tubes. Now I know whereof she spoke, since I never saw one in the flesh.
Must have been pretty satisfying to go back there and see the upturn in interest in your field, and be the one giving the talk. Sweet.
Ooh, WAIF have streaming. Now to figure out when 1-2pm is in real time. ;-D

Anonymous said...

Ok, but why haven't you aged in the last seven years?

Unknown said...

stevej - its simple to identify fellow astronomers traveling to a conference when all the tube-carriers gather at the same terminal!

mike - from what i've been told, i look the same as i did at 14... for better or worse.

Steve Jeffery said...

You aired at about 6pm our time, which unfortunately was before I get back from work. Fortunately I'm an enormous geek so by the magic of remote control I managed to work something out with Streamripper and an MP3 clipper, so I have a 22mb MP3 of your 45 minute slot, which I just finished listening to.
That was enormously cool. Gotta love a show that opens with the full Galaxy Song. Nice to put a voice to the face, and you handled that like a pro I must say. Entertaining, engaging and educational throughout. Cleared up some stuff for me anyway. And M51 sure is pretty, you're not wrong there. ;-D

On the subject of the double edged sword of remaining forever young, yeah, come to England. We have a lower drinking age, and apparently lax enforcement, so you may only get asked for ID half the time. I jest, but I can certainly recommend some welcoming local drinking holes.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for coming on the air Amanda - I knew you'd be a great guest, and I think a lot of people were jazzed about what you had to say. Now if we can just invent a way to steer the Milky Way away from Andromeda, we'll be able to lower our collective future insurance rates.

I think community-based communication tools like radio are a great way to inform and excite people about science, especially astronomy. Sidewalk astronomy takes to the air! For those of you interested in future episodes, the show is evolving, and you can keep track of it via my blog - link above (which currently has nothing about the show yet on it - but it will!)

Thanks again Amanda!

Unknown said...

that interview was a lot of fun! thanks so much davin!!

the bad news is that i didnt take a picture and the studio recording failed :( so could i have a copy of your recording, steve j??

Steve Jeffery said...

Oh no! Sure, it's a fairly hefty file but I'll see what I can do.

Steve Jeffery said...

You should have mail ... hopefully anyway. ;-D