Over the years, I have given a large number of talks on various topics in astronomy and physics to diverse crowds. When I worked as an explainer and later Outreach Officer, many talks were about popular astronomy -- is there life in space, will we ever live on Mars, and what are black holes? Recently, I have given several talks to especially astronomical societies about my own research.
I have also a small repertoire of lecture series with one on galaxies being the most prominent one that I held in 2017 for the Danish University Extension. Furthermore, I have covered some lectures on electromagnetism for first year university students at the University of Hull.
This talk focuses on the phenomena of quasars and active galactic nuclei (AGN). Their discovery in the 1960s puzzled astrophysicists with their unusually large brightness and small size. A plethora of explanations as to what they were appeared, varying wildly from a cascade of supernovae to compact star clusters. Going through different observations of quasars and AGN, we piece together what exactly must be happening and ultimately arrive at what we believe they are today: a supermassive black hole in the heart of the galaxy.
Galaxies are sometimes talked about as lonely star islands in the Universe, but the reality is that very few galaxies are ever lonely. In fact, interactions with other galaxies shape them and decide their faiths. They are very much dependant on their environment. But what exactly is a galaxy interaction, and what does galaxy environment mean? This talk goes through how some galaxies woosh past each other while others collide in spectacular mergers. Some galaxies prefer to reside by themselves, while others find themselves among hundreds, if not thousands, of neighbouring galaxies.
Besides talk that is very specific to my research, I also have an inventory of popular astronomy talks. These topics include, but is not limited to:
I am always happy to present other topics within astronomy on a popular science level even if that is not listed!
