Guest speaker Rick Chappell shatters some common misperceptions about gravity in space and shares his personal experiences from his training days as a back-up payload specialist for the NASA space shuttle. Chappell is a research professor of physics at Vanderbilt University and is also director of the Vanderbilt Dyer Observatory.
This podcast is an episode of Stellar Conversations, casual conversations with astronomers from Vanderbilt Dyer Observatory for people who are not necessarily science aficionados. The program taps the expertise of astronomers in a way that makes it accessible to the average listener. Each show is approximately three to five minutes in length, touching on such subjects as the expanding universe, stellar nurseries and astrobiology. It is our hope that "Stellar Conversations" may serve as the seed that interests young people in a life of science and exploration.
About your hosts: Rocky Alvey, superintendent at Vanderbilt Dyer Observatory, has been conducting educational programs and public outreach in Tennessee for the last six years giving presentations to thousands of people on all aspects of astronomy.
Nancy Dwyer, Outreach Coordinator at Dyer Observatory, has worked at the observatory for over two years and has developed a passion for promoting science and astronomy to schoolchildren.
Contact: Nancy Dwyer, (615) 373-4897
nancy.dwyer@vanderbilt.edu
Media contact: Melanie Moran, (615) 322-NEWS
melanie.moran@vanderbilt.edu