Physics Colloquium - Fall 2006 - Signs of Water on Distant Earth-like Planets
The Maynard F. Jordan Planetarium and the Dorothy Whitehouse Memorial Fund
University of Maine, Orono, Maine
Presents
Dr. Darren Williams
Assistant Professor of Physics & Astronomy
Penn State Erie, the Behrend College
Signs of Water on Distant Earth-like Planets
Earth-like planets with surface water will reflect light differently than planets without. Specular reflection of starlight from water oceans will make planets appear anomalously bright nearcrescent phase when starlight is incident the surface of a remote planet at a glancing angle. In addition, planets with oceans, active hydrological cycles, and tilted spin axes should demonstrate
seasonal brightening from the accumulation of snow and the formation of sea ice. Futuristic space telescopes will one day be used to discover and monitor the appearance of distant Earth-like planets. Careful measurement of seasonal brightness variations will reveal which of these planets are most likely to have water and water-dependent life.
Biographical Description
Dr. Darren Williams is Associate Professor of Physics and Astronomy at Penn State Erie, The Behrend College. He is the author/co-author of more than ten research papers on the origin and evolution of habitable planets, and his research has been featured in Nature, National Geographic, Astronomy, Sky and Telescope, and Discover magazines. Dr. Williams received his B.S. in Physics from the University of Pittsburgh in 1992 and a Ph.D. in Astronomy and Astrophysics from the Pennsylvania State University in 1998. He was a NASA-funded graduate-student fellow from 1995-1998 and was the 1996 winner of the Geophysical Society of America Stephen Dwornik award for planetary science. He is also the program chair for the physics major program at the Behrend College.
Friday, November 10, 2006
3:10 pm
140 Bennett Hall
Refreshments will follow in Rm. 114, Bennett Hall
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