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February[0]=["3","Roman Rafikov","Princeton University","Signposts of planetary systems around evolved stars","Recent Spitzer observations have revealed presence of near-IR excesses in spectra of more than thirty white dwarfs with atmospheres enriched in metals. These excesses are naturally interpreted as reprocessing of the stellar emission by compact, optically thick disks of dusty debris. The prevalent idea for the origin of such disks is the tidal disruption of asteroids scattered by massive unseen planets, providing evidence for the existence of the latter around white dwarfs. This circumstellar material has also been proposed as the natural cause of high-Z element pollution of the host white dwarf atmospheres. Accurate measurements of abundances of different elements in these atmospheres give us a unique chance to measure the bulk composition of extrasolar minor objects. I will provide an overview of observations in this rapidly developing area, and will describe recent progress in our understanding of the transfer of high-Z material from the compact circumstellar debris disk onto the white dwarf surface.","",""];

February[1]=["10","Conny Aerts","University of Leuven/Radboud University Nijmegen","A Decade of Asteroseismology in Action","After a basic introduction on how asteroseismology works in practice, we illustrate its application to various kinds of stars of different mass and evolutionary stage. We show how detected oscillation modes allow us to understand details of the interior structure of stars that are impossible to unravel otherwise.  The talk will focus on the major questions of how stars rotate internally and what type of chemical mixing they undergo. We highlight as well the asset of asteroseismology as a practical tool for galactic structure and exoplanetary studies.  We end by summarizing ongoing and future observational projects.","",""];

February[2]=["17","Phil Armitage","JILA","Turbulence in Planet Formation","A combination of sub-mm observations and numerical simulations have the potential to yield direct constraints on the environment of planet formation. After a review of recent observational surprises, I will discuss the implications of our first principles simulations of turbulence within protoplanetary disks, and how they may be tested observationally. I will argue that both observations and theory point toward a model in which early stage planet formation is concentrated at specific radii, and present preliminary dynamical models of growth from these initial conditions.","",""];

February[3]=["24","Andrew Gould","Ohio State University","Microlensing Takes Off: Toward the Galactic Distribution of Planets","After 50 years of dreaming about it, space-based microlensing observations are now underway.  A 2014 100-hr Spitzer Pilot Program generated microlens parallaxes for dozens of lenses, opening the prospect of measuring the Galactic distribution of planets.  This program will be expanded 8-fold in 2015.  Analogous observations by Kepler will measure the mass function of free-floating planets. WFIRST microlensing observations will, as advertised, complete the planetary census but they will do an immense amount of astrophysics as well.  I discuss how microlensing's take off builds on rapid, ongoing, ground-based developments.","",""];

March[0]=["3","John Peacock","Edinburgh","Measuring and modelling redshift-space distortions in the galaxy distribution","Deviations from a uniformly expanding universe are of interest in modern cosmology, most particularly because the amplitude of such peculiar motions measures the strength of gravity on scales of roughly 10-100 Mpc. I will review various recent attempts to measure these velocity effects in leading galaxy surveys, together with new rapid approximate means of generating the simulated universes that are needed in order to extract validated results from the data.","",""];

March[1]=["10","Naoko Kurahashi Nielson","Drexel University","Detecting Cosmic Neutrinos with IceCube at the Earth's South Pole","The IceCube Neutrino Observatory has recently discovered a diffuse flux of astrophysical neutrinos, neutrinos from beyond the solar system. But how does one collect neutrinos at the South Pole? Why study neutrinos for astronomy? In this talk, I will try to answer such questions. I will discuss the multiple diffuse flux analyses in IceCube that observe the astrophysical flux, and what each can tell us. Spatial analyses that aim to identify the sources of such astrophysical neutrinos will also be discussed, followed by an attempt to reconcile all results, to draw a coherent picture that is the state of neutrino astronomy.","",""];

March[2]=["17","Chris Matzner","University of Toronto","Investment advice for star destroyers","The first light of a core-collapse supernova emerges the moment a shock front breaches the stellar photosphere — just after the star has been engulfed by its explosion, and just before it releases its fastest ejecta. Shock emergence is implicated in several types of transients, including low-luminosity gamma-ray bursts and fast-evolving explosions found in the optical. Some of these events require this phenomenon to divert an unusually large fraction of the explosion energy toward the stellar surface. This raises the question: how can a given stellar mass and explosion energy be distributed to yield the most spectacular shock breakout? I will address this question for both spherical and non-spherical explosions, and identify several scenarios in which real events might be especially dramatic. For non-spherical explosions the development of strong, non-radial motion provides an unexpected dividend, a new source for transient emission.","",""];

March[3]=["24","David Kaplan","UW Milwaukee","The Radio Time Domain and the Murchison Widefield Array and Beyond","Explorations of the radio sky in the time-domain are an exciting frontier in astrophysics, and one where new observational capabilities will open up new windows on the universe. As one of a new generation of widefield, low-frequency radio telescopes, the Murchison Widefield Array has enormous potential to conduct blind searches for radio transients.  We are working to develop a common framework with the Australian Square Kilometer Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) Variables and Slow Transients (VAST) survey to allow real-time transient detection and characterization. I will discuss the expected types of sources that we hope to discover with the full array, explore some of our initial results, and highlight plans for the next generation of facilities.","",""];

March[4]=["31","Daniel Proga","UNLV","The Physics of Radiation-Driven Outflows in Active Galactic Nuclei","I review the physics of launching, acceleration, and propagation of radiation driven winds. I will consider two kinds of outflows powered by radiation emitted from the AGN central engine: <br>(1) outflows driven from the innermost part of a black hole accretion disk and <br>(2) outflows driven from a large-scale inflow. I discuss the relevance of both types of outflows to the so-called AGN feedback problem. However, as the AGN feedback should not be considered separately from the inner working of AGN, I also discuss the issue whether the properties of the same outflows are consistent with the observed gas properties in broad- and narrow-line regions of AGN.","",""];

April[0]=["7","Peter Goldreich","Caltech/IAS","Enigmatic Enceladus","Saturn’s satellite Enceladus displays a bewildering array of thermal activity. I will describe our attempts to understand these phenomena in terms of tidal heating associated with the 2:1 mean motion resonance between Enceladus and Dione. Then I will argue that Enceladus and the other midsize satellites of Saturn are young.","",""];

April[1]=["14","Rosalba Perna","Stony Brook","Highly magnetic neutron stars: bewildering astrophysical laboratories and cosmological tools","Anomalous X-ray Pulsars and Soft Gamma-Ray Repeaters (SGRs) are young neutron stars characterized by high X-ray quiescent luminosities, outbursts, and, in the case of SGRs, sporadic giant flares.  They are believed to be magnetars, that is neutron stars powered by ultra-strong magnetic fields. However, the diversity of their behaviours, and, especially, the observation of magnetar-like bursts from 'low-field' neutron stars, has been a theoretical puzzle.  In the first part of the talk, I will discuss results of long-term MHD simulations which, by following the evolution of magnetic stresses within the neutron star crust, have allowed to relate the observed magnetar phenomenology to the physical properties of the neutron stars, and in particular to their age and magnetic field strength and topology.  The dichotomy of high-B field pulsars versus magnetars is naturally explained, and occasional outbursts from old, low B-field neutron stars are predicted.  In the second part of the talk, I will discuss how observations of highly magnetized neutron stars can be handy tools in the cosmological domain, and in particular as a way to set constraints on the hypothetical particle axion.","",""];

April[2]=["21","Bruce Macintosh","Stanford University","Direct imaging of extrasolar planets and the Gemini Planet Imager","With current technology, young (<100 Myr) planets can be directly imaged - resolved from their parent star - in the near-infrared with adaptive optics. I will discuss results from such imaging, particularly the four-planet system orbiting HR8799. The outer two planets have been characterized spectroscopically using adaptive optics on the Keck telescope, showing non-equilibrium chemistry as well as evidence of composition enhanced in C/O from the original stellar nebula. The next step in direct imaging is Gemini Planet Imager and its counterparts on other telescopes. GPI is a a facility-class instrument operating on the Gemini South telescope, combining advanced adaptive optics with a coronagraph and near-infrared integral field spectrograph. Almost an order of magnitude more sensitive than current instruments, GPI had first light in November 2013. I will present an overview of the instrument and early science results including the orbit and spectrum of the planet Beta Pictoris b, polarization of the HR4796A circumstellar dust disk, and the status of the 600-star GPI Exoplanet Survey. Finally, I will discuss the potential of the WFIRST/AFTA space telescope for direct exoplanet imaging.","",""];

April[3]=["28","Enrico Ramirez-Ruiz","UC Santa Cruz","Heavy element synthesis in the Universe","The source of about half of the heaviest elements in the  Universe has been a mystery for a long time. Although the general  picture of element formation is well understood, many questions about  the nuclear physics processes and particularly the astrophysical details  remain to be answered. Here I focus on advances in our understanding of the origin of the heaviest and rarest elements in the Universe.","",""];

May[0]=["5","Annika Peter","Ohio State University","The GeV Sun","The Sun does not shine at GeV energies on its own power, but because cosmic rays interact with its matter and light.  By observing and modeling these interactions in and near the Sun, one may learn about cosmic-ray propagation in the inner heliosphere and in the solar atmosphere.  In this talk, I will present new observations of the Sun with the Fermi/LAT instrument which show that the Sun is a luminous source of E > 10 GeV gamma rays.  These observations suggest that all attempts so far to model the cosmic-ray interactions with the Sun are incomplete, and highlight our ongoing efforts to reconcile these observations with our models.  Finally, I will discuss the implications of this work for the Sun as a GeV - TeV signal for gamma-ray and neutrino observatories.","",""];

May[1]=["12","Christopher Kochanek","Ohio State University","In Search Of: Failed Supernovae","Failed supernovae, where core collapse leads to the formation of a black hole without an external supernova, have always been one of the possible outcomes when a massive star dies.  The observed properties of the dying, progenitor stars, mismatches between the star formation and supernova rates, the black hole mass function and theoretical studies of the explodability of massive stars all suggest that failed supernovae represent 10-30% of core collapses, probably dominated by 20-25 Msun progenitor stars.  I will describe a search for failed supernovae with the Large Binocular Telescope and its first candidate.","",""];

September[0]=["15","Eric Agol","University of Washington","The Gravity of Kepler Systems","","",""];

September[1]=["22","Andrey Kravtsov","University of Chicago","Order Out of Chaos: Formation of Galaxies in a Hierarchical Universe","Galaxy formation is a complex, hierarchical, and highly non-linear process.  It involves gravitational collapse of dark matter and baryons; supersonic, highly compressible and turbulent flows of gas; star formation and stellar feedback; as well as heating, cooling, and chemical processes. All of these processes appear to be critically important in shaping the properties of galaxies. At the same time, despite the apparent complexity of these processes and the ways they interact, the observed properties of galaxies exhibit a number of striking regularities.  These include tight correlations between galaxy sizes, masses, luminosities, and internal velocities, and surprisingly tight correlations between the properties of stars and gas in galaxies, and the mass and extent of their parent halos dominated by dark matter.  The existence of such correlations indicates that powerful processes operate to bring order out of chaos. In this talk, I will discuss some insights based on recent work aimed at understanding this aspect of galaxy formation, focusing on some specific issues in how the masses of galaxies and their host dark matter halos are assembled, and in how thermodynamic processes of diffuse gas, star formation, and stellar feedback conspire to produce galaxies quite close to observed systems.","",""];

September[2]=["29","Lars Bildsten","University of California Santa Barbara","New Insights into Stellar Interiors from Asteroseismology","","",""];

October[0]=["6","Cullen Blake","University of Pennsylvania","MINERVA-Red: An Intensive Survey for Planets Orbiting the Nearest Low-mass Stars to the Sun","Recent results from Kepler and ground-based exoplanet surveys suggest that low-mass stars are host to numerous small planets. Since low-mass stars are intrinsically faint at optical wavelengths, obtaining the Doppler precision necessary to detect these companions remains a challenge for existing instruments. I will describe MINERVA-Red, a project to use a dedicated, robotic, near-infrared optimized 0.7 meter telescope and a specialized Doppler spectrometer to carry out an intensive, multi-year campaign designed to reveal the planetary systems orbiting some of the closest stars to the Sun. The MINERVA-Red cross-dispersed echelle spectrograph is optimized for the “deep red”, between 800 nm and 900 nm, where the stars that will be targeted are relatively bright. The instrument is very compact and designed for the ultimate in Doppler precision – it uses a single-mode fiber input. I will describe the spectrometer and the status of the MINERVA-Red project, which is expected to begin routine operations at Whipple Observatory on Mt Hopkins, Arizona, in 2016.","",""];

October[1]=["13","Ellen Zweibel","University of Wisconsin at Madison","The Macrophysics and Microphysics of Cosmic Rays","Cosmic rays comprise only about one billionth of interstellar particles in the Milky Way, but have as much energy as the thermal gas.  Low energy cosmic rays affect the chemistry and thermodynamics of interstellar through collisional processes. Higher energy cosmic rays affect interstellar gas dynamics collisionlessly, though coupling to plasma waves. I will discuss the interactions between the cosmic rays and gas in the collisionless regime and discuss applications to galactic outflows, cosmic ray transport in galaxy clusters, and the propagation of cosmic rays through the intergalactic medium.","",""];

October[2]=["20","Marla Geha","Yale University","The Baryon Content of Isolated Dwarf Galaxies","Environment plays a major in role in the evolution of galaxies. This is particularly true of low mass dwarf galaxies where more massive galaxies dramatically affect the local gravitational potential. Isolated galaxies offer a unique test bed for comparisons to theoretical models where the complicating physics of galaxy–galaxy interactions are minimized. For galaxies less massive than M_star < 10^9 M_sun, we have shown that ending star-formation requires the presence of a more massive neighbor. I will discuss follow-up observations to study the gas content in our isolated galaxies and discuss the implications of these results for quenching mechanisms at all scales.","",""];

October[3]=["27","Eliot Quataert","University of California at Berkeley","The Surprisingly Dynamic Last Years in the Lives of Massive Stars","In the last few years of the lives of massive stars, fusion in the core of the star produces a nuclear power that greatly exceeds the Eddington luminosity. This drives vigorous convection in numerous core and shell burning phases. I describe the surprising effect that waves excited by such convection can have on the properties of massive stars in the years leading up to core collapse. Wave transport of energy into the stellar envelope can power prodigious mass loss in the last year of stellar evolution. And angular momentum transport by waves excited during shell burning phases may well determine the angular momentum of the pre-supernova core, setting the birth spins of compact objects.","",""];

November[0]=["3","Dan Green","CITA, University of Toronto","nu Physics in the CMB","","",""];

November[1]=["10","Ray Pierrehumbert","Oxford University","Climate Dynamics of Condensible-Rich Exoplanet Atmospheres","On the present Earth, the primary condensible substance — water vapor — represents only a few percent of the mass of the atmosphere.  While the effects of the latent heat of phase change are dynamically significant, the direct effects of mass loss are minimal, and in particular do not have to be taken into account in the energy or momentum budget of the atmosphere.  In a wide variety of important planetary contexts, however, the condensible substance can make up a major fraction of atmospheric mass. This occurs for water vapor in the near-runaway states at the inner edge of the conventional habitable zone, and for carbon dioxide near the outer edge, but the situation arises in a wide variety of other planetary circumstances.  In this talk I will present results from my ongoing project to develop an understanding of the fluid dynamics and climate physics of such objects.","",""];

November[2]=["17","Janet Vertesi","Princeton University","TBA","","",""];

November[3]=["24","Maryam Modjaz","New York University","Stellar Forensics with Explosions: Supernovae, Gamma-Ray Bursts, and their Environments","Nature's two magnificent explosions, long-duration gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) and stripped-envelope supernovae (SNe), are both products of collapsing massive stars. Yet, over the last 15 years, we have not determined the detailed make-up of the stellar progenitors of each kind of explosion, nor the conditions that lead to each kind of explosion in massive stripped stars. While long-duration GRBs emit relativistic jets of high-energy radiation, stripped SNe are core-collapse explosions whose massive progenitors have been stripped of their outer hydrogen and helium envelopes.  <br> <br> I will present a number of comprehensive observational studies that probe the progenitor environments, their metallicities and the explosion parameters of SNe with and without GRBs, as well as those of normal Stripped SNe, with the goal of constraining their progenitor systems and explosions mechanisms. I will conclude with an outlook on how the most promising venues of research - using the many existing and upcoming innovative surveys such as the Palomar Transient Factory and LSST - have shed new light on the diverse deaths of massive stars, and will continue to do so.","",""];

December[0]=["1","Pieter van Dokkum","Yale University","Forming Massive Galaxies","The talk begins in 2005, with the unexpected discovery that massive early-type galaxies were extremely compact at redshifts z~2. It is now thought that the remarkable size growth of these galaxies from z=2 to z=0 is largely due to minor mergers; the size distribution of early-type galaxies at high redshift is arguably the most direct evidence of the importance of late mergers in the assembly of massive galaxies. Recently the attention has turned to the question how these compact cores of present-day ellipticals were formed, and what the properties were of their star forming ancestors. Using the 3D-HST survey, combined with extensive Keck spectroscopy, we have constructed a straightforward, self-consistent description of this core formation phase that differs conceptually from other recent studies. Our description has surprisingly wide applications: as part of the analysis, we show that star formation apparently leads to a universal relation between size growth and mass growth of the form d(log r) ~ 0.3 d(log M), and we derive a simple model for the growth of galaxies over the past ~10 billion years.","",""];

December[1]=["8","Juna Kollmeier","The Carnegie Observatories","TBA","","",""];

December[2]=["15","Hilke Schlichting","Massachusetts Institute of Technology","TBA","","",""];