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Podcaster: Dr. Meg Rosenburg

Title: Craters in Context: Science and History of Impact

Organization: The Society of Physics Students (SPS) at The University of Central Arkansas

Link : The Society of Physics Students (SPS) at The University of Central Arkansas

Cosmoquest

This is a short (2-minute) video I made, originally as part of my thesis defense, to introduce the impact process:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fM3yxyzJJ3I

Here’s an introduction to impact cratering and crater morphology (shape characteristics) from the Lunar and Planetary Institute:http://www.lpi.usra.edu/exploration/education/hsResearch/crateringLab/lab/part1/background/

Over at CosmoQuest, the MoonMappers project enlists the public to help out with crater counts on the Moon: http://cosmoquest.org/?application=simply_craters

Description:Everywhere we look in the solar system, from our own Moon to Mars to the icy satellites of the outer planets, there are surfaces covered in impact craters. Today, we understand these holes in the ground to be remnants of cosmic collisions, an extremely common (if rather violent) process, and impact is how we make sense of a whole host of observations. Cratered terrains provide a basis for understanding the timing of events on a planetary surface, and these events can even be correlated between planets. Analysis of the sizes of impact craters can also potentially tell us which population of objects caused them in the first place, which puts constraints on dynamical models of solar system formation.


Bio: The Society of Physics Students (SPS) at The University of Central Arkansas is incorporates outreach, demonstrations, tutoring and guest speakers into our SPS Chapter.

Dr. Meg Rosenburg is a freelance science communicator, content producer, and independent scholar based in the Boston area.  In 2014, she earned her Ph.D. from Caltech in Planetary Science, with an extra focus in the history of science, and she’s especially interested in impact craters on the Moon and Earth, their contribution to planetary topography, and how they have been interpreted over the centuries.

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365 Days of Astronomy
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