NASA has some great pictures of a newly active solar flare region. The area has (as of March 4) released three flares, one of which came with a broadband radio burst, a type of radiation which can interfere with terrestrial radio signals.
Monthly Archives: March 2012
Physics & Astronomy Colloquium – THIS WED., 7th March – DR. JENNIFER McNAB, Harvard
Poster: http://www.physics.uwo.ca/colloquia/Colloquia%20Notices/2011_2012/McNAB%20Research%20Talk.pdf
Western University
DEPARTMENT OF PHYSICS AND ASTRONOMY
PHYSICS & ASTRONOMY COLLOQUIUM
Date: Wednesday, 7th March 2012
Time: 1:30 p.m.
Location: Physics & Astronomy Seminar Room 22
Dr. Jennifer McNab
Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging
Harvard Medical School
Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA
“Developing Biomarkers of Neuroplasticity Using Diffusion MRI”
ABSTRACT
The human brain has a tremendous ability to adapt and compensate for injury. My research is centred on the development of non-invasive biomarkers of specific neuroplastic features implicated in the recovery process including: axonal branching, changing cortical cellular composition and changing axon diameter distributions. My approach is to map these non-invasive biomarkers using advanced diffusion MRI techniques that leverage recent advances in human MRI technology including 7x stronger encoding gradients, improved detectors and advanced diffusion acquisition and modeling techniques. For patients recovering from a brain injury (e.g. traumatic brain injury or stroke), biomarkers are needed in order to advance and refine neurorestorative treatments, to stratify patients in clinical trials and to guide individualized patient care.
#UWOPhysastro has a new Facebook look.
Our #UWOPhysAstro facebook pages have been updated with the new timeline look.
Fatal fire halts science at Brazilian Ferraz antarctic base.
The Toronto Star has a great article (along with this photo) about how the fatal fire at the Brazilian Ferraz base has affected the atmospheric science being done by Prof. Wayne Hocking of Western.
Spectacular! Who knew #LDNont at night could be so spectacular?
(unless you are trying to do observational astronomy).
I was surprised that this apparently hasn’t been on our blog, maybe some of you haven’t seen it yet (it created quite a buzz in early January)? London’s Story Box Productions time lapse video of London at night really surprised me, I think of the YXU as such a small town but it looks like a Megopolis at night. Excellent soundtrack by Erwin Steijlen is a great match as well.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDKXXv60-7E?wmode=transparent]
On the lighter side of the pain of the #PEARL closure, #uwophysastro banner showing Crow Emily & the CRL lidar. Great job Henry! #westernu
Bob McDonald: Closure of polar lab a blow to Canada’s scientific reputation #CBCNews #westernu
via cbc.ca
Host of CBC’s award winning radio show Quirks & Quarks Bob McDonald weights in on the PEARL closing, stating that the closing “has once again lowered this country’s environmental reputation on the world scene.”
Physics & Astronomy Colloquium – THURS. 15th March – DR. VIKTOR STAROVEROV, Western Chemistry
Poster: http://www.physics.uwo.ca/colloquia/Colloquia%20Notices/2011_2012/STAROVEROV%20Colloquium.pdf
Western University
DEPARTMENT OF PHYSICS AND ASTRONOMY
PHYSICS & ASTRONOMY COLLOQUIUM
Date: Thursday, 15th March 2012
Time: 1:30 p.m.
Location: Physics & Astronomy Seminar Room 22
Dr. Viktor Staroverov
Department of Chemistry
Western University
“Advances in Density-Functional Methods for Electronic Structure Calculations”
ABSTRACT
Density-functional theory (DFT) is the most successful though imperfect computational tool of chemistry and condensed-matter physics. Current research efforts in DFT concentrate on improving the existing density functionals and on developing new ideas that might lead to better approximations. In this talk, I will explain the challenges faced by theorists and show—by drawing upon the recent work in our group—how valuable physical insights and better numbers can be obtained by adopting a new approach to the problem. This approach consists of shifting the focus from exchange-correlation energy functionals to the corresponding effective potentials.
Coffee & cookies will be available, courtesy of PASA.
Losing sight of our sovereignty, on the loss of Canada’s high Arctic atmospheric observatory and how it affects Canada’s “bottom line”.
Please read this on the Purple Crow Lidar Blog, as I thought it a better location for it. The blog piece is entitled:
Why Canadians should care about the closure of the PEARL Observatory
http://blog.purplecrowlidar.ca/why-canadians-should-care-about-the-closure-o
It’s not a feel-good story.