LATROBE, PA – Saint Vincent College’s Herbert W. Boyer School of Natural Sciences, Mathematics and Computing, in partnership with the College’s chapter of the Society of Catholic Scientists, will host Dr. Rachel Patton, astrophysicist at the University of Pittsburgh, who will present a talk titled “The Dynamic Lives of Stars.”
Free and open to the public, the event is scheduled for Thursday, April 30, at 7 p.m. in the Dr. Frank J. Luparello Lecture Hall, located inside the Sis and Herman Dupré Science Pavilion on the College’s campus.
“Stellar evolution lays the foundation for most facets of astronomy,” Patton said. “While theory has been extraordinarily successful in reproducing observed populations of stars, many discrepancies and open questions remain.”
The talk will describe how stars evolve through time, and how that evolution can be wildly altered in the presence of double star companions.
Patton will also discuss how astronomy uniquely opens our hearts and minds to perceive both the wonders of creation and the Creator Himself.
Patton’s presentation is part of Forward: A Boyer School Lecture Series, which celebrates the diversity of those practicing in the school’s academic disciplines and to remember the work of Saint Vincent College founder Archabbot Boniface Wimmer, O.S.B., who came to the area to serve the immigrant population of southwestern Pennsylvania.
Patton holds a PhD in astronomy from Ohio State University. She is currently a Samuel P. Langley Pittsburgh Particle Physics, Astrophysics and Cosmology Center (PITT PAC) postdoctoral fellow at the University of Pittsburgh, and she is a founding member of the new Pittsburgh chapter of the Society of Catholic Scientists.
Admission is free, and there is no required registration. Doors open at 6:30 p.m. Parking is available in Lot A. For more information contact Dr. Daniel Vanden Berk, associate professor in the Department of Physics in the College’s Boyer School, at daniel.vandenberk@stvincent.edu.
