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January[0]=["27","Kevin Schawinski","Yale","The Co-Evolution of Galaxies and Black Holes","How, why and when are the scaling relationships between black holes set? Do accreting black holes really regulate the evolution of their host galaxies? What physical mechanisms underly feedback? I will discuss some recent results made possible with data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, the Hubble Space Telescope and the citizen scientists taking part in the Galaxy Zoo. I will show how host galaxy morphology is a key parameter in co-evolution scenarios and that the nearest quasar to us underwent a dramatic shutdown in the very recent past. Finally, I will present some very recent observational work on black hole growth in the very early Universe (z>6).","",""];
February[0]=["3","Roman Scoccimarro","NYU","Primordial non-Gaussianity and Large-Scale Structure","","",""];
February[1]=["10","Daniel Fabrycky","UCSC","Planetary Systems from Kepler","On Feb. 2, the Kepler space mission released its first 4 months of data on all targets, as well as a series of papers on statistical results on transiting exoplanets.  Perhaps the biggest surprise is the great abundance of candidate multiple-planet systems; out of 997 targets with a candidate transiting exoplanet, 170 of them hosted multiple candidates.  I describe the dynamics (stability, transit timing variations) and architecture (resonances, inclinations) of these new planetary systems.  Dynamics allows us to confirm that some of these systems are indeed planetary (Kepler-9, Kepler-11), and continued monitoring of these and other systems (the ultra-compact KOI-500, the coorbital KOI-730) will challenge and refine theories of the formation of planetary systems.","",""];
February[2]=["17","Eran Ofek","Caltech","First results from the Palomar Transient Factory","","",""];
February[3]=["24","James Peebles","Princeton Univ.","The Pure Disk Galaxy Puzzle","","",""];
March[0]=["3","John Johnson","Caltech","The Golden Age of Exoplanet Spin-Orbit Measurements","","",""];
March[1]=["10","Matthew Kleban","NYU","Cosmic Bumps Make Two Humps","","",""];
March[2]=["17","Nikhil Padmanabhan","Yale","Reconstructing Baryon Oscillations--Theoretical and Observational Perspectives","","",""];
March[3]=["24","Nir Shaviv","Hebrew Univ.","Super-Eddington Accretion Disks","I will review our present understanding of super-Eddington atmospheres, as borne from theory and observations. In particular, I will show how atmospheres can sustain super-Eddington fluxes, while accelerating only ``moderate'' mass loss. This will then be applied to the modeling of super-Eddington accretion disks. Such models can have net accretion which is super-critical and a net luminosity which is super-Eddington.","",""];
March[4]=["31","Sean McWilliams","Columbia","Gravitational wave astronomy in the advanced detector era","With the imminent start of Advanced LIGO/VIRGO observations, and the less imminent but much hoped-for advent of LISA, gravitational wave science will transition from a specialty of theoretical astrophysics and experimental interferometry to a specialty of observational astronomy. To take full advantage of second-generation instruments capable of precision gravitational wave measurements, we require a detailed understanding of the anticipated gravitational waves, as well as any electromagnetic signatures that may be coincident. To this end, I will discuss recent work estimating the achievable accuracy for modeling and ultimately measuring compact binary parameters from gravitational wave observations, as well as potential electromagnetic signatures that may accompany these events. I will also discuss the potential for a novel constraint of dark energy through coincident gravitational wave and electromagnetic measurements, and the outstanding issues that must be solved to maximize the achievable science from these observations","",""];
April[0]=["7","Floyd Stecker","GSFC, NASA","Testing Lorentz Invariance with Cosmic Gamma-Rays, Ultrahigh Energy Cosmic Rays and Neutrinos","","",""];
April[1]=["14","Saul Perlmutter","Berkeley/LBNL/IAS","Dark Energy Measurements from Supernovae: One Observationalist's Mid-Semester Report Card","A decade since the realization that our universe's expansion is accelerating, the ball remains in the observationalists' court -- as the theorists look for more constraints on the parameter space.I will discuss some of the progress that has been made, and the prospects for upcoming advances, primarily focusing on the supernova measurements.The supernova measurements have improved dramatically, and I will show new evidence that that they have not yet reached their ultimate capability.Combined with the advances in the other techniques, we have the hope of distinguishing alternative explanations of the accelerating universe.The next big step calls for new facilities on the ground and in space.","",""];
April[2]=["21","Nadia Zakamska","KIPAC/Stanford, JHU","Observations of quasar feedback","Black hole feedback -- the strong interaction between the energy output of supermassive black holes and their surrounding environments -- is routinely invoked to explain the absence of overly luminous galaxies, the observed high temperatures of intracluster medium and the black hole / bulge correlations. I will review the theoretical basis of this phenomenon, existing observational evidence for feedback in various types of active galaxies and present recent observations of our group illustrating black hole feedback in action.","",""];
April[3]=["28","Brant Robertson","Caltech","Did Star-Forming Galaxies Reionize the Universe?","Star-forming galaxies represent a valuable tracer of cosmic history. Recent observational progress with the Hubble Space Telescope has led to the discovery and study of the earliest-known galaxies at a time when the universe was only ~800 million years old.  Intense ultraviolet radiation from these early galaxies probably induced a major event in cosmic history: the reionization of intergalactic hydrogen.  In this talk I will briefly review the status of HST observations of distant star-forming galaxies, and focus on current theoretical challenges in interpreting the data and understanding the connection between these distant galaxies and the process of cosmic reionization.","",""];
May[0]=["5","Stephanie Tonnesen","Princeton Univ.","Location, Location, Location!  Pair Interactions versus Environment:  Effects on Galaxy Evolution","","",""];
May[1]=["12","Kristen Menou","Columbia","Exoplanetary Atmospheres","","",""];
May[2]=["19","Dave Spiegel","Princeton Univ.","The Deuterium-Burning Mass Limit, and Problems with the TiO Hypothesis","","",""];
May[3]=["26","Saurabh Jha","Rutgers","Cosmology with Supernovae: Progress and Prospects","Type Ia supernovae (SN Ia) are exquisite tools with which to trace the history of cosmic expansion, and they have a starring role in attempts to understand the dark energy that drives our accelerating Universe. Current supernova samples have grown to a size where systematic uncertainties are beginning to dominate statistical ones. I will describe the factors that limit the precision of our cosmological inferences and avenues for improvement, with a focus on understanding the reddening of SN Ia (by dust or otherwise) and constraining SN Ia progenitor models through observations of peculiar objects. I will also discuss new applications of precise distances from SN Ia in current and upcoming surveys.","",""];
June[0]=["2","Marc Imhoff","GSFC, NASA","Satellite Supported Estimates of Human Rate of NPP Carbon Use on Land: Challenges Ahead","The human demand for products of photosynthesis is a powerful measure of the aggregate impact of human action on the biosphere and indicator of societal vulnerability to climate change. We show results from several studies that use satellite and statistical data to estimate the amount of Earth’s net primary production (NPP) on land required to support regional and global use of food, fiber and NPP-based fuel products across a ten-year period.  Earth’s planetary NPP ‘supply’ was estimated using AVHRR vegetation index and MODIS derived NPP products to establish a baseline extending from 1982 – 2005. NPP carbon ‘demand’ was estimated by applying biophysical models to consumption data from the UN Food and Agriculture Organization to calculate the annual amount of NPP required for the products consumed. Results show that globally, humans consume more than 20% of Earth’s total net primary production on land and that both populations and per capita consumption increased between 1995 and 2005. Regionally, the NPP-carbon balance percentage varies from 6% to over 70% and locally from near 0% to over 30,000% in major urban areas. Large uncertainties exist in both supply and demand calculations but while the supply trend varies in sign demand continues to rise. Scenarios modeling the impact of per capita consumption, population growth, and technology suggest that NPP demand as percent of supply is likely to increase substantially in the next 40 years despite better harvesting and processing efficiencies","",""];
June[1]=["9","Yue Shen","CFA","Searching for binary supermassive black holes: from tens of kpc to kpc scales","Binary SMBHs are generic outcomes of hierarchical galaxy mergers. They are of great value in understanding the role of galaxy mergers in AGN fueling and the interplay between SMBHs and their hosts, as well as predictions for future gravitational wave detection experiments. While pervasive in theoretical models, despite decades of searching, binary SMBHs with separations below a few kpc remain extremely difficult to find. In this talk I will discuss ongoing searches for binary SMBHs at various separations, with focuses on our recent work on tens of kpc to kpc-scale binary AGNs selected from SDSS. This is a first step towards quantifying the demographics of low-redshift (z<0.3) binary AGNs on kpc scales.","",""];
June[2]=["16","Uri Keshet","CFA","Dynamical and nonthermal processes in galaxy clusters","Recent observations of galaxy clusters reveal new insights into the dynamical and nonthermal processes in the intracluster medium (ICM). Tangential discontinuities (known as cold fronts) are directly seen in high resolution X-ray maps of cool cluster cores. They reveal bulk shear flows which magnetize the plasma, give rise to radio minihalos, and may play a role in resolving the cooling problem. The ICM shows a rich phenomenology of non-thermal radio emission, arguably arising from hadronic cascades involving cosmic-ray protons. While such a secondary signal is too weak to be observed by Fermi, the primary gamma-ray signal from strong shocks should be identifiable","",""];