Institute of Advanced Studies

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

An Institute of Advanced Studies Masterclass with Bryan Gaensler, Professor and Federation Fellow, Sydney Institute for Astrophysics, School of Physics, The University of Sydney

About this Masterclass
Our Sun and solar system are part of the Milky Way Galaxy, a vast glittering pinwheel containing hundreds of billions of stars.

Any astronomy textbook or website will list our Galaxy's vital statistics: for example, the Milky Way is 100 000 light years across, weighs around one trillion times the mass of the Sun, and rotates once every 220 million years. But how do we determine these numbers? And how sure are we that they're right?

In this Masterclass Professor Gaensler will explain how astronomers have been able to gradually uncover our place in space over the last 100 years. He will then focus on some of his team's recent work, in which they have made surprising new measurements of the thickness of the Milky Way, and have begun to unveil the beautifully-ordered but invisible magnetic fields that are spread throughout the Galaxy.

About Bryan Gaensler

Bryan Gaensler is an astronomer and Professor of Physics at The University of Sydney, and is a Federation Fellow of the Australian Research Council.

Professor Gaensler is a graduate of The University of Sydney, from which he was awarded the University Medal in physics in 1995, followed by a PhD in physics in 1998. He subsequently held positions as a Hubble Fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, as the Clay Fellow at the Smithsonian Institution and then as an Associate Professor at Harvard University, before returning to Australia in 2006.

Professor Gaensler's current research interests focus on the origin of magnetism in interstellar space, the demographics of neutron stars and black holes in our Milky Way, and the identification of variable and transient sources of radio emission. He is the Editor-in-Chief of Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia, and is the former International Project Scientist for the Square Kilometre Array, a next-generation radio telescope.

Professor Gaensler was the 1999 Young Australian of the Year, gave the 2001Australia Day Address to the nation, was a 2005 Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow, and was the recipient of the 2006 Newton Lacy Pierce Prize awarded by the American Astronomical Society. He has authored over 160 scientific papers, and has written dozens of popular articles on astronomy, science and education.

Enrolment is limited to allow for a relaxed, informal atmosphere.