Colloquia Schedule Summer 2015

Colloquia are on Tuesdays (unless otherwise indicated) at 3:30 pm in RLM 15.216B


Tue. 10 AM May 19	Qualifying Exam/2nd-Year Defense "Revealing the Brightest Galaxies at Cosmic Brunch" The star formation density in the universe ramps up smoothly at early times and peaks at z~2, or "cosmic high-noon," before turning over. Little is known about the mechanisms that dominate stellar mass build-up at z>2, or "cosmic brunch." This mystery of galaxy growth can be addressed observationally using large numbers of galaxies over a large dynamic range in, for example, stellar mass, star formation rate, and halo mass. Currently, the most efficient way to accomplish this is with large-area, multi-wavelength photometric surveys. In this talk I present the HETDEX/NEWFIRM survey, the K-band imaging survey of the 28 deg^2 HETDEX fall field, which is being carried out by a number of astronomers here at UT. In addition, I will present my work using the field's optical imaging data (u', g', r', i', and z') from the Dark Energy Camera to construct a luminosity function for z=4 Lyman break galaxies (LBGs). The large area of the survey allows us to capture the most luminous and most rare galaxies in the universe, extending existing z=4 LBG luminosity functions at the bright-end. These bright galaxies are particularly interesting because they are the progenitors of today's richest galaxy clusters. Finally, I will advertise future work that will incorporate Spitzer/IRAC photometry, Herschel photometry, XMM/Newton observations, and HETDEX spectroscopy to investigate the relationships between star formation, modes of gas accretion, and environment during the epoch of cosmic brunch. close Matthew Stevans University of Texas at Austin
Mon. 11:00 AM June 22	PhD Defense "Photon Budget for Ionizing Intergalactic Gas During Cosmic Reionization and Imprint of the Ionized Gas in the Cosmic Microwave Background" abstract Hyunbae Park University of Texas at Austin
Tue. 10 AM July 7	PhD Defense "The Development of Replicated Optical Integral Field Spectrographs and their Application to the Study of Lyman-alpha Emission at Moderate Redshifts" abstract Taylor Chonis University of Texas at Austin
Mon. 10 AM Aug 10	PhD Defense "Star Formation in Molecular Clouds" abstract Nalin Vutisalchavakul University of Texas at Austin
Mon. 11 AM Aug 17	PhD Defense "Formation of the First Galaxies under Stellar Feedback" abstract Myoungwon Jeon University of Texas at Austin
Wed. 2 PM Aug 19	PhD Defense "GRB Photospheric and the X-ray Flare Radiation Mechanism" Rodolfo Santana University of Texas at Austin