Gordon Garmire, Evan Pugh professor of astronomy and astrophysics, will give a free public lecture, "Black Holes, Stellar Explosions and Stellar Birth: Exploring the X-ray Universe with the Chandra X-ray Observatory" at 2 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 5, in 101 Thomas Building on the University Park Campus.
Garmire will discuss the powerful X-ray vision made possible by the new Chandra X-ray Observatory. Attendees will have an opportunity to meet with Garmire and other faculty members from the Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics following the lecture.
The new observatory was launched on the Space Shuttle Columbia on July 23, and was built for NASA by companies and universities including Penn State. NASA awarded Penn State the contract to build the CCD Imaging Spectrometer, one of four scientific instruments on NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, under the direction of Garmire and his team of astronomers.
Garmire's talk is the second in a series of five lectures planned this academic year.
Paul E. Bolin, associate professor of art education, and Albert Anderson, associate professor emeritus of art education, both in the School of Visual Arts, will lecture on the topics "Books as Objects -- and More" and "Collecting Books and Printed Materials on the Visual Arts," at 7 p.m. Monday, Dec. 6, in the Palmer Museum of Art's Palmer Lipcon Auditorium on the University Park campus. The two talks are part of the lecture series "Drawing from the Past: Perspectives on Rare Books and Printed Materials in the Visual Arts." The lectures are free to the public.
Bolin received his master of science and doctoral degrees in art education from the University of Oregon. He is editor of Art Education, the journal of the National Art Education Association, and head of Penn State's art education program.
Anderson received his doctoral degree in art education from Ohio State University. He is co-editor with Bolin of the proceedings of the Third International Symposium on the History of Art Education (1997).
The lecture series addresses the subject of rare books and printed materials in the visual arts from the 16th century through the 19th century. The series is sponsored by the Center for the History of the Book, the Department of Art History, the Art Education Program and the School of Visual Arts.
The challenges facing the children and families in South Africa is just one aspect of an upcoming seminar, to be held from 4 to 5:30 p.m. Dec. 8 in 102 East Henderson Building on the University Park campus.
The free seminar, "Development and Intervention in Southern Africa: Preschoolers, School Children and Youth," is part of an interdisciplinary effort to promote international research, exchange and collaboration between the University and researchers in South Africa.
Researchers from universities in South Africa will introduce attendees to several studies currently under way. Linda Richter of the University of Natal will describe research in early childhood-mother interactions and its implications for prevention.
Christine Liddell of the University of Ulster will follow by discussing her research in evaluating preschool intervention programs. Gillian Finchilescu of University of Capetown will conclude by discussing her research on the sociopolitical attitudes of South African adolescents.
Two lectures in the Life Sciences Consortium's Colloquium are scheduled for the coming weeks. The first is a talk by Dr. James O'Callaghan, a neurotoxicologist and team leader of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health's (NIOSH), Molecular Neurotoxicology Laboratory. O'Callaghan will speak on "What the Drug and Dance Culture Can Teach Us About Neurotoxicology" at 4 p.m. Tuesday, Dec. 7. The colloquium will be videoconferenced from Lecture Room D at The Hershey Medical Center to 108 Wartik Laboratory, University Park, and to several other campus locations.
O'Callaghan's research group investigates response of the central nervous system to chemical- and disease-induced injury.
Ronald McKay, chief of the laboratory of molecular biology in the basic neuroscience program of the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, National Institutes of Health (NIH), will give the second talk on "Building Brains with Stem Cells" at 4 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 11. The colloquium will be videoconferenced from Lecture Room D at The Hershey Medical Center to 101 Thomas Building and several other campus locations.
Before his position at NIH, McKay was at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Oxford University and Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory.
Glenn "Hurricane" Schwartz, weather forecaster from Philadelphia's NBC News 10's weekend morning and evening broadcasts, will speak in the Main Student Lounge at Penn State Delaware County at 11:30 a.m. Tuesday, Dec. 7, as part of the campus' Alumni Speaker Series.
Schwartz's background in meteorology spans more than 20 years beginning in 1974, at the National Hurricane Center in Miami, Fla. From Miami he traveled to Atlanta, Ga. He spent seven years in Atlanta, three at Atlanta's National Weather Service.
He began his broadcast experience interning at WPVI in the early 1970s, and was responsible for the station's contract with Accu Weather.
Schwartz graduated from Penn State in 1972 with a bachelor of science degree in meteorology.
The event is free to the public. For more information, call (610) 892-1272.
Robert A. Buhrman, the John Edson Sweet professor of engineering and applied physics at Cornell University, will present lectures on Dec. 8 and 9 in the Distinguished Materials Physics Lecturer Series on the University Park campus.
Buhrman's first lecture, intended for a general audience, is titled "Explorations with Nanostructured Materials: Still Plenty of Room at the Bottom," and will take place at 8 p.m. Wednesday, Dec. 8, in 101 Thomas Building. This lecture will include an overview of significant developments in nanofabrication technology over the last few decades, illustrating how this technology has been used for patterning materials at ultrasmall length scales.
Buhrman's second, more technical, lecture is titled "Spin Transport in Magnetic Nanostructures," and will take place at 3:30 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 9, in 101 Osmond Laboratory. In this talk, Buhrman will review some recent developments in the study of spin-dependent transport and nanoscale magnetic systems.
Ching-Chung Kuo, associate professor of operations management at Penn State Harrisburg, will discuss "Practical Applications of Operations Research" at noon Wednesday, Dec. 8, as part of the Current Issues in Business lecture series presented by the Penn State Harrisburg School of Business Administration.
The free lecture will be at the Penn State Harrisburg Eastgate Center, 1010 N. Seventh St., Harrisburg.
Kuo will explain that operations research deals with scientific approaches to problem solving. It encompasses a host of quantitative techniques that have been developed within or adapted from disciplines in natural and social sciences.
For information or to register, call the Eastgate Center at (717) 772-3590.
Robert Drago, professor of labor studies, will speak on the topic "What Gives? A Time Diary Study of Teachers and Caring Time" at 2 p.m. Friday, Dec. 10, in 102 Weaver Building on the University Park campus.
The lecture will feature time-diary data from 323 full-time elementary school teachers on time spent caring for children and others during a workday.
For more information, call (814) 865-5425.