The David Elder Lectures

The 2009 David Elder Lecture

Monday 18 May 2009 at 6:00 pm in lecture theatre K3.25.

John Anderson Building, 107 Rottenrow East, Glasgow G4 ONG

By Professor Chris Collins, Astrophysics Research Institute, Liverpool John Moores University

Prof Chris Collins Cosmology could never be accused of being a modest subject, after all its primary aim is nothing less than to understand the entire universe! With the development of modern telescopes (and the occasional “good idea” along the way), progress in our understanding of the universe over the last century has been nothing short of remarkable. However, many important questions still remain unanswered. In his lecture, Chris Collins will explore the landmark discoveries of the subject and discuss such intriguing questions as what is the ultimate fate of the universe, what is it made of exactly and how did galaxies and stars form? Along the way we will learn about the big bang, dark energy and the cosmic background radiation; we will also find out why cosmology is more exciting today than it has ever been and why both the sport of boxing and winged beetles are of no help to cosmologists whatsoever!

The 2008 David Elder Lecture:

14 May 2008 at 6.00pm in lecture theatre K3.25.

John Anderson Building, 107 Rottenrow East, Glasgow G4 ONG

By Prof Monica Grady, The Open University, Milton Keynes

Every year, between 40,000 and 60,000 tonnes of meteorites fall on the Earth’s surface – a huge amount of material. Fortunately, though, it very rarely arrives all in one large lump. Most of this extraterrestrial material comes as dust. Sometimes, though, there are consequences of these uninvited guests dropping in. In her lecture, Monica Grady will explore just why the dinosaurs became extinct, and why it is important to keep penguin feathers out of Antarctic ice. Along the way, she will also consider some of the things that we can learn from meteorites, these visitors from space whose arrival cannot be predicted.

The 2007 David Elder Lecture:
The Origin and Future of the Universe

The 2007 David Elder lecture will be given by Prof Gerry Gilmore, FInstP, ScD, Professor of Experimental Philosophy at the University of Cambridge on 7 March 2007 at 5:45pm in lecture theatre K3.25 in the John Anderson building, 107 Rottenrow East, Glasgow.

Prof Gerry Gilmore's website

Cosmologists can now say with some confidence that our Universe consists for 5 percent of matter like that of which we are made, 25 percent some other, still unknown, form of transparent matter, and 70 percent of a still mysterious form of dark energy, which is controlling the fate of the Universe. Each step in our growing knowledge corresponds to a developing appreciation of the (lack of) significance of our direct 'common sense' view of nature.

Millennia of study by the greatest minds led, by the 16th century, to a Universe with Man at its head and its centre, with all Creation subject to Mankind’s desires – an approach still often evident in global planning. Precision large-scale science then arose, rapidly leading to Copernicus and Newton, and our eventual realisation that observation and analysis required a quite different description of reality. The 'Copernican principle', which is essentially that any explanation for an observation or event which requires a special role for Man or a deity is wrong, has since been applied with great effect, leading to the startling practical and conceptual successes of modern science, and its technological offspring. Astrophysics has extended this Copernican discovery concept so far that we know, as noted above, that everything that we see in the Universe, and the very type of matter of which we are made, is an almost insignificant perturbation on a deeper and very different reality.

Yet we are able to describe much of the past history of the Universe, from its origin as an imperfect fluctuation in nothing, to the present when gravity has lost control of the fate of the Universe, to consider why the laws of physics allow a Universe which supports life, and to consider possible far futures.

The 2006 David Elder Lecture:
The Huygens Probe at Titan

The 2006 David Elder lecture will be given by Professor John Zarnecki of the Open University on Wednesday the 3rd of May 2006 at 18.00 in room K3.25 of the John Anderson Building, 107 Rottenrow East, G4 0NG Glasgow.

After an interplanetary journey of more than seven years, the European Space Agency's probe Huygens landed on the surface of Saturn's largest moon Titan, having been released from NASA's Cassini spacecraft on Christmas Day 2004. Titan, which is larger than the planet Mercury, is the only planetary satellite in the entire Solar System to possess a significant atmosphere. Most interestingly, it appears that Titan's atmosphere is the site of a whole range of chemical reactions that produce increasingly complex hydrocarbon molecules as might have occurred in Earth's early atmosphere over 4 billion years ago. The journey of the Huygens probe will be described as well as its final dramatic plunge to the surface. Early results will be presented with emphasis on the British contribution.