CSC/SETI Institute Colloquium Series

Dec. 3

David Hinson, SETI Institute

The Weather on Mars

In this talk Dave Hinson will examine the weather on Mars using a combination of radio occultation data and wide-angle images obtained by Mars Global Surveyor during its final year of operation. These complementary observations provide a unique perspective on key atmospheric phenomena such as dust storms and winter weather systems (baroclinic eddies). This investigation is revealing the mechanisms through which eastward-traveling eddies influence both the timing and location of distinctive "flushing" dust storms that occur in the topographic basins of the northern hemisphere.

Dec. 10

 Special Panel: Pete Worden, Pavel Podvig and Will Marshall

Nuclear Weapons and Space Weapons

Our panellists will present three 15 minute technical and scientific presentations on standard space and nuclear weapons capabilities and effectiveness, national requirements and intentions, existing conventions and potential future agreements, followed by 15 minutes for questions and discussion. All discussions will be on unclassified or declassified material.

Pete Worden will give a briefing on United States, Russian, Chinese and other nations postures on weapons in space, nuclear and non-nuclear, (from pistols in Soyuz capsules on up to Star Wars) how they have evolved, why they have worked so far and how he sees them working in the future, and how they can best be shaped in the future. Will Marshall will talk about space agreements of the future and Pavel Podvig will talk about the arsenals of different nations.

Jan 14

Dr. Laura T. Iraci
NASA Ames Research Center

Laboratory Studies of Water Ice Cloud formation under Martian Conditions

Water ice clouds are an important part of the martian hydrological cycle, influencing the water and energy budgets. Microphysical models can be used to study the connections between cloud formation and water distribution throughout the system (for example, as surface frost layers), but only if the intricacies of cloud formation and growth are understood and properly parameterized. To that end, we have performed laboratory studies of water ice nucleation on a variety of surrogate materials and have found that initiation of ice is more difficult than often presumed. We will report these results, along with preliminary growth rate observations.

Mar. 4

Richard Muller, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, UC Berkeley

Discovery of Strong Cycles in Fossil Diversity

Richard Muller and his collaborators have recently analyzed the most complete record of marine animal fossils ever compiled, the "Compendium" of Jack Sepkoski, which lists all known fossil marine animal genera back 542 million years. When the fossil diversity (number of distinct genera) is plotted, it shows a very strong 62 Myr cycle. The cycle is particularly evident in the species that endured for relatively short times, as shown in the diagram below (published in Nature, vol 434, 208-210, 10 March 2005).