Building Stars, Planets & the Ingredients of Life in Space - by Ewine F. van Dishoeck [11May, 2017]
Channel: IUCAA SciPOP
Date: 2017-06-08

Building stars, planets and the ingredients for life in space

Thursday - May 11, 2017, 6:30 p.m.
Chandrasekhar Auditorium, IUCAA
S. P. Pune University Campus

Prof. Ewine F. van Dishoeck
Leiden Observatory, Leiden University, the Netherlands

One of the most exciting developments in astronomy is the discovery of thousands of planets around stars other than our Sun. But how do these exo-planets form, and why are they so different from those in our own solar system?  Which ingredients are available to build them?  Thanks to powerful new telescopes, especially the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA), astronomers are starting to address these age-old questions scientifically.  Stars and planets are born in the cold and tenuous clouds between the stars in the Milky Way, and ALMA allows us to zoom in on planetary construction zones for the first time.  Water and a surprisingly rich variety of organic materials are found, including simple sugars.  Can these pre-biotic molecules end up on new planets and form the basis for life elsewhere in the universe?

Bio:  Ewine F. van Dishoeck is a professor of molecular astrophysics at Leiden University, the Netherlands, and external scientific member of the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics in Garching. She graduated at Leiden University, and held positions at Harvard, Princeton and Caltech from 1984-1990. The research of her group is at the boundary of astronomy and chemistry and uses ground- and space-based observatories to study the molecular trail from interstellar clouds to planet-forming disks.  She holds many national and international science policy functions, including president-elect of the International Astronomical Union (IAU), scientific director of the Netherlands Research School for Astronomy (NOVA), co-PI of the JWST-MIRI instrument, and (former) ALMA Board member.  She has been fortunate to receive many awards, including the Dutch Spinoza award and the Dutch Academy Prize. She is a Member of the Dutch Royal Academy of Sciences and the German Leopoldina Academy, and Foreign Associate of the US National Academy of Sciences and of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.