When Galaxies Collide... - Professor Carolin Crawford

There is a whole Universe of different shapes, sizes and colours of galaxies. We shall look at some of the 'ordinary' galaxies and then move on to consider the more peculiar systems, discussing quite how and why they came to morph into such strange shapes.

Outreach Officer at the Institute of Astronomy and Fellow of Emmanuel College, University of Cambridge, and Gresham Professor of Astronomy (2011–2015), Carolin Crawford is one of Britain's foremost science communicators.

After receiving her PhD from Newnham College, Cambridge, Professor Crawford went on to a series of fellowships from Balliol College, Oxford, Trinity Hall, Cambridge and the Royal Society. In 2004 she was appointed as a Fellow and College Lecturer at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, where she is now also the undergraduate Admissions Tutor for the Physical Sciences. Since 2005 she has combined her college role with that of Outreach Officer at the Institute of Astronomy at the University of Cambridge.

Professor Crawford’s primary research interests are in combining X-ray, optical and near-infrared observations to study the physical processes occurring around massive galaxies at the core of clusters of galaxies. In particular, she observes the complex interplay between the hot intra-cluster medium, filaments of warm ionised gas, cold molecular clouds, star formation and the radio plasma flowing out from the central supermassive black hole.

In 2009 Professor Crawford’s outstanding abilities at science communication were recognised by a Women of Outstanding Achievement Award by the UK Resource Centre for Women in Science, Engineering and Technology, presented for “communication of science with a contribution to society.”

Appointed as the 36th Gresham Professor of Astronomy in 2011, Professor Crawford delivered a series of free public lectures where she carried out her intention “to showcase the very latest developments and ideas in astronomy and cosmology, whilst putting them into the context of the process of scientific discovery.”

When Galaxies Collide... with Professor Carolin Crawford was recorded live on 17 April 2013

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and...

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently nearly 1,500 lectures free to access or download from the website.
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