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Launch Pad 2014 Retrospective and Slides

Launch Pad Astronomy Workshop

I’ve been meaning to write about my experience at this year’s Launch Pad Astronomy Workshop for a while now. Ok, who am I kidding, I’ve been meaning to write about anything on this blog for a while now but I’ve been so busy with my new job that there has been precious little time for anything else. (In fact, no sooner did I return home from Wyoming than I had to re-pack my stuff and head up to New York City for meetings — talk about contrast.)

Which is why Launch Pad couldn’t have come at a better time for me. Yes, it’s a lot of work, and yes, it consumes a great deal of my personal CPU, but it’s a welcome reset from the daily routine and a chance to do what I love to do best — tell cool people about the universe.

And what a bunch of cool people! Launch Pad self-selects for those who want to learn astronomy and who are willing to commit the time and expense to spend a week with us in Laramie, WY to do it. Each year brings a group of truly wonderful people and I couldn’t have been more delighted to get to know this years’ participants.

Far better writers than I such as Andrew Liptak, Jenn Reese, Sarah McCarry, Susan Forest, Gabrielle Harbowy, and others took the time to express their thoughts on this year’s Launch Pad and I highly recommend checking them out. In the meantime, as promised, here are my slides from this year’s workshop (NOTE: The file sizes on most of these are very large so please be patient as they download):

Exploring Our Solar System — I’d like to think this subject is somewhat self-explanatory, but it’s awfully hard to condense the entire solar system into a one-hour talk. Especially since we’re finding out so many things about it.

Motion, Energy, and Gravity — I had to rush through this one to get it ready for presentation but I think we got the main points covered here.

Binary Stars and Exoplanets — I pride myself on this one as the work I did on binary stars as an undergrad used the same techniques that detect extrasolar planets today. It turns out it wasn’t a matter of telescope power — the signal was hiding in the noise the whole time, just waiting for the computational horsepower to improve.

Stars — How stars’ temperature and radii determine their luminosity, how their spectra allow us to classify them according to their temperature and mass, and how they form in the first place.

Stellar End States, Part 1 — How low-mass stars evolve and die, with a preview of things to happen to our Sun starting in a few billion years.



Getting to share the universe with such wonderful people is always a joy, but I think this year was extra special thanks to our advisor Peepy dropping by to help us.

We’ll be doing this again next year so I guess I’d better start updating my slides.

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Launch Pad 2014 is GO

Launch Pad Astronomy Workshop A lot of behind-the-scenes work has been going into making this year’s Launch Pad Astronomy Workshop a reality. First, we are actually funded this time, thanks in no small part to an Education and Public Outreach (E/PO) grant from Space Telescope Science Institute, and of course to Mike Brotherton for writing a winning proposal.

Launch Pad is only as good as the people who attend, and this year we have an amazing lineup:

It’s shaping up to be another great year and I am looking forward to meeting these amazing  people!

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The Launch Pad Anthology is Here!

The Launch Pad Anthology, edited by Jody Lynn Nye and Mike Brotherton

After last year’s Launch Pad workshop for writers, attendees discussed an idea about contributing to an anthology. A year later, that idea has manifested itself in the first Launch Pad Anthology.

The Launch Pad Anthology was co-edited by Jody Lynn Nye and Mike Brotherton, with an introduction by Kevin R. Grazier, an astronomer at UCLA and science advisor to the Battlestar Galactica reboot series.

All of the contributors to the anthology are Launch Pad alumni. This first anthology includes:

As an added bounus, Jody Lynn-Nye’s Spectromancy Tuckerizes all of us who attended and taught at Launch Pad 2012. So there’s a Captain Doug Farren, a DATLOW report, and I even make an appearance in there as well. It’s so cool to have such talented friends who can whisk you away to the stars with a stroke of a pen.

Launch Pad is about educating writers about science so they may in turn teach their audiences through their works. It’s great to see an anthology like Launch Pad doing just that.

So what are you waiting for? Buy yours today!

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Launchpad 2013 Review

The class of 2013 from left to right: Jennifer Campbell-Hicks, Claudine Griggs, Douglas Dechow, Jay O'Connel, Jennifer Marie Brissett, Brenda Clough, Jamie Todd Rubin, Liz Argall, Andy Romine, Caren Gussoff, Chaz Brenchley, Jeri Smith-Ready, Anna Leahy, Doug Farren. Kneeling in front: Andria Schwortz, Me, Mike Brotherton
The class of 2013 from left to right: Jennifer Campbell-Hicks, Claudine Griggs, Douglas Dechow, Jay O’Connel, Jennifer Marie Brissett, Brenda Clough, Jamie Todd Rubin, Liz Argall, Andy Romine, Caren Gussoff, Chaz Brenchley, Jeri Smith-Ready, Anna Leahy, Doug Farren. Kneeling in front: Andria Schwortz, Me, Mike Brotherton

Over the weekend, we said goodbye to 14 newfound friends from the Launchpad Astronomy Workshop for Writers. It was a long, fun, and challenging week but by far the hardest challenge was realizing that had come to an end. Here’s why:

Launchpad is essentially astronomy 101 crammed into a one-week crash-course tailored for science fiction & fantasy writers, editors, filmmakers, and other creative professionals. It’s held on the campus of the University of Wyoming where my friend Mike Brotherton is an Associate Professor of Astronomy. Last year, he invited me to be a guest instructor and as much as I enjoyed myself then, I had a much better experience this second time around for several reasons.

For one thing, I had a much better idea of what to expect this year, and was able to prepare my lectures accordingly. Mike had me teach the same topics as last year, plus asked me to teach some new topics, including binary stars and exoplanets. In fact, I have a post on my slides from launchpad you can peruse, though it may not make as much sense without me explaining them. In any case, the great preparation and coordination with Mike and fellow instructor Andria Schwortz meant that I wasn’t staying up as late preparing for my talk the next day. I did, of course, stay up just as late talking with Mike about all sorts of nonsense.

As much as I enjoyed giving and watching the lectures, getting the attendees out of the classroom and into the lab was even better. Attendees got to try their hand at identifying elements from their spectra, detecting exoplanets from Kepler data, and processing Hubble images.

Chaz Brenchley having a go at identifying elements from their emission spectra
Chaz Brenchley having a go at identifying elements from their emission spectra

Even better, we were able to get up to the Wyoming Infrared Observatory (WIRO) on Jelm mountain on Wednesday night. It’s always a treat to come face-to-face with a 2.3-meter telescope. Even better, the students were taking spectra of a binary star system, which is a topic that is always near and dear to my heart 🙂

The 2.3-meter Wyoming Infrared Observatory (WIRO) telescope atop Jelm Mountain.
The 2.3-meter Wyoming Infrared Observatory (WIRO) telescope atop Jelm Mountain.

As much fun as it was, it was a lot of hard work so taking a break with a hike in Vedauwoo national park was a nice change of pace, even if 1/3 of our group fell at some point.

A view of our hike in Vedauwoo National Park.
A view of our hike in Vedauwoo National Park.

But my favorite part of this year’s Launchpad was that my wife joined me this time. Jeri is a pretty good writer in her own right and it was great being in an environment where she could talk shop with fellow writers as well as geek out on astronomy. As much as she already knew about astronomy, this was her best exposure to it yet. Besides, we like being together:

As much fun as it was, it was a lot of work, especially for us instructors. And yet, we’re already thinking about next year!

For others’ perspectives on this year’s launchpad, check out my listing of everyone’s blog posts and recaps. And once again, a huge thank-you to our funders this year, without whom, none of this would have happened!