The annual William C. Shaw Lecture presented by SIUE’s Physics Department will pair up with the 2013 season of Arts & Issues to present Dr. John C. Mather, one of the world’s most prominent astrophysicists, on Thursday, Sept. 26, at 7:30 p.m. in the Morris University Center’s Meridian Ballroom.
Mather is a senior astrophysicist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center and specializes in infrared astronomy and cosmology. He was a co-recipient of the 2006 Nobel Prize in physics.
Mather was the project scientist on NASA’s Cosmic Background Explorer (COBE) satellite. The COBE measured the spectrum (color) of the heat radiation from the Big Bang, discovered hot and cold spots in that radiation, and hunted for the first objects that formed after the great explosion. He and co-researcher George Smoot were awarded the Nobel Prize for this work.
Mather currently serves as senior project scientist for the development of the James Webb Space Telescope, the successor to the Hubble Space Telescope. This new telescope will look even farther back in time than Hubble, and will peer inside the dusty cocoons where stars and planets are being born today.
Mather’s presentation entitled “History of the Universe from the Beginning to End” will discuss the history of the universe in a nutshell – from the Big Bang to now and on to the future.
In addition, Mather will explain Einstein’s biggest mistake, how Edwin Hubble discovered the expansion of the universe, how the COBE mission was built and how the COBE data support the Big Bang theory.
Tickets for the general public are $15. Tickets for SIUE faculty, staff, retirees, alumni and seniors 65 or older are $10. Admission is free for students. For ticket information, visit www.artsandissues.com.
