2018-2019

News Release

REF NO.: 3

SUBJECT: PSA: Search for Earth's twin subject of upcoming public lecture

DATE: October 3, 2018

A woman known as the “astronomical Indiana Jones” will give a public lecture at Memorial University.
 
Dr. Sara Seager of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a planetary scientist and astrophysicist who grew up in Toronto.
 
She’s a pioneer in the vast and unknown world of exoplanets – planets that orbit stars other than the sun – and she’s on a quest to find the field's Holy Grail, the discovery of a true Earth twin.
 
For thousands of years people have wondered if there are planets like Earth. Are such planets common and do any have signs of life? Today astronomers are poised to answer these ancient questions, having recently found thousands of planets that orbit nearby stars, called exoplanets.
 
Dr. Seager will share the latest advances in this revolutionary field at her public lecture titled Exoplanets and the Search for Habitable Worlds, hosted by the Faculty of Science and the Department of Earth Sciences.
 
It will take place Wednesday, Oct. 10, at 7 p.m. in the Bruneau Centre for Research and Innovation, room IIC-2001. Limited free parking will be available in lot 17 and a reception will follow. All are welcome.

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