UNMC faculty, students and staff are cordially invited to a special seminar on data science and astronomy by Caltech astronomer S. George Djorgovski, Ph.D., at Creighton University.
The lecture will be from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. April 20 in the Harper Center, Room 3023, at Creighton University. Lunch will be provided, so please RSVP here.
Directions to the Mike and Josie Harper Center at Creighton University can be found here.
Dr. Djorgovski will speak on “From Space to Cyberspace: Astronomy and Science in the 21st Century.”
Essentially all aspects of the modern human endeavor are being transformed by information technology and the resulting exponential deluge of data. Dr. Djorgovski will describe how this has changed astronomy, illustrating his points with several examples of the exciting recent discoveries, from new planets to black holes and gravitational waves.
He will then place this in a broader context of how science and scholarship in general are being transformed by information technology and computing in the era of “big data.” This offers both new opportunities and challenges, the chief of which is turning data into actionable knowledge and understanding. A new scientific methodology is emerging, strengthening the historical synergy between science and technology, and leading to practical innovations that will benefit all.
Dr. Djorgovski is a professor of astronomy, the incoming executive officer (department chair) for astronomy, and the founding director of the Center for Data-Driven Discovery at Caltech.
After receiving his Ph.D. from the University of California at Berkeley, he was a Harvard Junior Fellow before joining the Caltech faculty in 1987. He was a Presidential Young Investigator, an Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Fellow, Fellow of the American Association for Advancement of Science, among many other honors and distinctions.