Podcaster: Shaila’s SpaceCast
Title: You Big Baby! Secrets of Star Formation
Organization: UNSW School of Physics, CSIRO Astronomy and Space Science
Links: https://www.physics.unsw.edu.au/staff/shaila-akhter; http://www.csiro.au/Organisation-Structure/Divisions/Astronomy-and-Space-Science.aspx ; https://www.facebook.com/UNSWPhysics
Description: High-mass stars are some of the most important celestial objects because they are the chemical factories that manufacture elements and compounds, and hence shape the evolution of galaxies. However, the processes by which they form and how they shape their environment during their birth processes are not well understood. We are using NH3 (ammonia) data from the “The H2O Southern Galactic Plane Survey” (HOPS) to define the positions of clumps of gas within dense cores in the southern Galactic plane that are likely to form stars. We did a comparative study with different methods for finding these clumps and proposed the best method for this dataset. In this talk, I will discuss how we use ammonia as a tracer to find the high-mass stars and the method that we used for our recent discoveries
Bio: Shaila Akhter is an Astrophysics PhD candidate, outreach co-ordinator and educator from Australia.
Today’s sponsor: This episode of “365 Days of Astronomy” is sponsored by — no one. We still need sponsors for many days in 2015, so please consider sponsoring a day or two. Just click on the “Donate” button on the lower left side of this webpage, or contact us at signup@365daysofastronomy.org.
End of podcast:
365 Days of Astronomy
=====================
The 365 Days of Astronomy Podcast is produced by NUCLIO. Audio post-production by Richard Drumm. Bandwidth donated by libsyn.com and wizzard media. You may reproduce and distribute this audio for non-commercial purposes. Please consider supporting the podcast with a few dollars (or Euros!). Visit us on the web at 365DaysOfAstronomy.org or email us at info@365DaysOfAstronomy.org. This year we celebrate cosmic light as light is our info messenger in the universe. Join us and share your story to celebrate the International Year of Light. Until tomorrow! Goodbye!
Hi Shalia, good talk. I wish I had the slides though.
I liked your use of Ammonia as a tracer, and also FellWalker to replace clumpfind. I used clumpfind when I did masters at Jodrell Bank on the pilot for CORNISH survey, and I still follow the science of high mass star formation. Are you going to follow up the talk (or have you already) in this direction.
Hi Steve,
Thanks a lot for all your kind words! This is my current PhD research and yes I am following up my research in this direction. I presented this talk at an amateur Astronomical Society on 16 November and recorded to publish it as my November vodcast, so pretty recent talk! If you follow the youtube link you can certainly pause and see the slides as they are all provided in the video as I talk. Loved to know that you also work on high mass star formation! Wish I could know more about your research 🙂
Cheers!
Shaila