Astrochemistry: It's Out of This World!
Sunday, March 2, 2008
1:00 p.m., Room 244 

Organizer:

Brian K. Nunnally, Wyeth Research and Louis J. Allamandola, NASA Ames Research Center

Speakers:

1:05      Chemistry in the Far Reaches of the Solar System:  The Expected and the Unexpected  DALE P CRUIKSHANK, NASA

1:40      In Situ Analysis of Rocks and Soils on Mars: The Alpha Particle X-ray Spectrometer on the Mars Exploration Rover Mission  DAVID MITTLEFEHLDT, NASA/Johnson Space Center

2:15      The Chemistry of Star Formation  ERIC HERBST, Ohio State University

2:50      Identifying Molecules in Space:  Combining the Analytical Power of Spectroscopy and Radio Astronomy  LUCY M ZIURYS, University of Arizona

3:25      Vibrational Astrospectroscopy  LOUIS J ALLAMANDOLA, NASA

Overview:

Ever since mankind gazed up to the heavens, there has been an innate fascination towards outer space.  This fascination reached a fever pitch in the late 1950s and 1960s.  While interest has waned, there is still a lot of interesting science and analytical chemistry projects.  This symposium will bring together some of the astrochemists in a series of presentations directed towards an analytical chemistry audience.  Our speakers are going to talk about Chemistry in the far reaches of the Solar system, Analysis of rocks and soils on Mars, the Chemistry of star formation, Identifying molecules in space, and the uses of Vibrational Astrospectroscopy.  This will be a symposium that is out of this world!