The History and Mystery Series - 2026
About
We, the ASA ECR Chapter (https://asa-ecr.org), are excited to launch a new online talk series called "The History and Mystery Series." This series aims to explore aspects of astronomy that are often overlooked in conventional scientific talks, such as social, political, geographical, and historical perspectives.These talks are open to everyone!
For this year, we have three talks scheduled:
* Speaker: Andrew Hopkins (Macquarie University)
Title: The History and Mystery of the stellar Initial Mass Function
Date and time: 10th Sept 2026, 1 PM AEST / 11 AM AWST
Abstract: The birth of stars and the formation of galaxies are cornerstones of modern astrophysics. While much is known about how galaxies globally and their stars individually form and evolve, one fundamental property that affects both remains elusive. This is problematic because this key property, the birth mass distribution of stars, referred to as the stellar initial mass function (IMF), is a key tracer of the physics of star formation that underpins almost all of the unknowns in galaxy and stellar evolution. It is perhaps the greatest source of systematic uncertainty in star and galaxy evolution. I will trace the history of measurements of the stellar IMF spanning the past seven decades, showing how the discussion has evolved, with a flavour for some of the personalities and conflicts along the way. I will introduce how arguments for the case that the IMF varies has slowly made an impact over the past two decades, and present some of the recent work and potential future directions for the field.
* Speaker: Nick Seymour (CIRA)
Title: What are QSOs, wrong answers only?
Date and time: 5th Nov 2026, 1 PM AEDT / 10 AM AWST
* Speaker: Michelle Cluver (Swinburne University)
Title: The History and Mystery of our Dusty Universe
Date and time: 19th Nov 2025, 1 PM AEDT / 10 AM AWST / 02:00 UTC
The event will be over Zoom and details will be mailed to your email upon registration.
Dates
Thursday 10 September 2026 - Thursday 19 November 2026 (UTC+10)Location
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The History and Mystery Series - 2026
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