University of Arizona

Thursday was spent at the University campus. First we
attended a lecture by Don McCarthy, an excellent science communicator as the
entire lecture was very interactive and had plenty of practical examples. After
the lecture, we met Jim Scotti at the Lunar Planetary Lab and visited the Space
Imagery Center where we were able to look at photographs from all of the Apollo
missions along with images from Magellan and Gemini amongst others. We were
able to wander freely around the centre and access all of the planetary atlases
and photobooks. After a break for lunch we visited the Steward Mirror Lab where
we were able to see the final stage of the mirror for the LSST, which should be
shipped to its location in the coming weeks. There were also two mirrors in
progress that are to be part of the Giant Magellan Telescope, a 7-mirror scope,
where each mirror is 8.4m in diameter, giving a total collecting area of
24.5m,which will make it the largest optical telescope in the world. The
mirrors made in the SML have a maximum diameter of 8.4m due to the unique way
in which they are created. The use a spin technique as they melt the glass to
give the surface a parabolic shape, which requires much less grinding and
polishing to be done after casting. The Oven Pilot is responsible for ensuring
that the furnace rotates at the correct speed and temperature. The glass used
is shipped from Japan by a Japanese company called Ohara in large chunks that
are inspected for impurities before becoming part of the mirror. The final
visit was to the HiRISE building, were we were shown around by several members
of the team and given a variety of images from the project to take back with
us. The team at HiRISE were so welcoming; they printed special images for our
visit with Welsh captions at the bottom as they knew we were visiting from
Wales, It really was one of the highlights of the trip.

Biosphere 2

This time, we visited biosphere 2, a project built originally to see if humans could live in a closed ecosystem, which would have been used for colonizing other planets. When the primary 2 year experiment took place, 6 people were locked inside biosphere 2 and left to run the centre from the inside, unfortunately it was revealed that they did not create enough oxygen for themselves, and so had to have a top up every few months. Some people considered the experiment a failure sure to this, but it is a learning process that revealed the limitations of a closed ecosystem, the limitations of which will be useful for the upcoming human Mars mission, Mars one. Biosphere 2 is currently owned by the University of Arizona and, while no longer used as a closed ecosystem, is still used as an experimental facility. Experiments conducted in previous years helped scientist’s discover some of the affects of climate change, such as CO2 being detrimental to coral in our oceans. Current work has turned the old agriculture area into an experiment on landscapes and weathering.
In the evening we met with some members of the universities astronomy club. About half of the members are astronomy majors with access to some of the amazing local telescopes we will be visiting later in the week. Being able to use these telescopes gives the students a wide range of research options and experience. I met Riley, who conducts spectroscopy research on exoplanets and works at one of the telescopes. Talking with them and learning the differences between American and British universities was very interesting.
And for anyone wondering, biosphere 1 is Earth!

Arriving in Tucson

Yesterday we visited the university of Arizona and got to know the grounds. The campus is far larger than any I have visited in the UK, with the student union being more than triple the size of the one at USW treforest campus. Within the university grounds there is an American football stadium and a baseball stadium along with other sports facilities. We unfortunately missed the planetarium show, but should be able to catch another one later in the week.