Swedish Spring

So spring has finally arrived...sort of. You still need a light jacket a few days and most evenings, but the plant life has bounced back faster than I thought it could. It is gorgeous and the sun starts to light the sky at around 3am (don't ask how I know). In any case, I presented a project yesterday for the IRF (Institutet för Rymdfysik), or the Swedish Institute for Space Physics and it went so well I am getting a contract to test space probes for NASA's MMS mission going up in two years. I say that is pretty good. :) I then had a seminar is Galaxy Physics which also went really well.

I also put the finishing touches on an Observational Astrophysics lab. We took pictures of M51 and used a program to edit the pictures to make our own color images. Here is one of my results...

Now I have to make a presentation for my Nuclear Astrophysics class on chemical abundances on the galactic thin and thick disk.

Oh yeah, one thing all prospective master's students should know...actually all students should know about Uppsala housing. It is difficult...and when you find a place, it is tradition to start looking for another one. :) Strange I know, but it can be kind of fun. You learn the town and are constantly meeting new people.

The interconnections of it all

Another week passed and another reason why this path I have chosen is a wonderful experience... In galaxy physics we had a seminar on AGNs (Active Galactic Nuclei for the non-indoctrinated) and galaxy clusters. In NAP, we had another guest lecturer, Prof. Edmunds. Both classes held my attention greatly...unfortunately not so much because of the material covered. The reason that my attention was held captive and I was enthralled and hanging on every single word was due to the interconnections between everything that I am learning here at Uppsala. During both the seminar and lectures, bits of information from other classes came up, which is to be expected, but the connections with things that I personally was studying made the lectures a wonderful experience. Being able to pick other people's brains from different places gives a much more varied image of the universe we live in and helps to be not only more objective, but to have different vantage points from which to draw conclusions. It also helps with memory retention. Having to access the same information in different contexts and at different times greatly improves understanding. I mean really...could it get any better when preparing for a career in research. :)