Science in our neighborhood: The Carnegie lectures

Scientists have worked continuously in Forest Hills for more than one hundred years. The National Bureau of Standards campus opened in 1903, and some of its employees found they liked living here too. Though the agency moved to the suburbs in the 1970s, other scientific endeavors were well under way. And they continue to this day.

In June 1907, Carnegie Institution’s Geophysical Laboratory opened at 2801 Upton Street (now home to the Levine School of Music; the Laboratory moved to Broad Branch Road in 1990). And Carnegie’s Department of Terrestrial Magnetism is celebrating its first century on Broad Branch Road. It opened at 5241 Broad Branch in 1914.

Each year, the Carnegie Institution invites the community to neighborhood lectures that truly bring the otherworldly down to earth. If that isn’t enticement enough, the talks are free, and they serve refreshments beforehand.

The first of the 2014-15 neighborhood lecture series will be Thursday, October 9th at 6:30. The Department of Terrestrial Magnetism’s Steve Shirey will talk about “The Geology of Diamonds and Why Yours Is Remarkable!”

The other upcoming talks:

Thursday, November 11th: The Geophysical Lab’s Douglas Rumble on “What Are You Breathing? Stable Isotopes in the Atmosphere”

Thursday, April 16th: GL’s Viktor Struzhkin on “The Quest for Room Temperature Superconductivity”

Thursday, May 14th: DTM’s Paul Butler on “Alien Worlds and the Origins of Science”

 
Where: Greenewalt Building on the campus at 32nd and Broad Branch.
When: 6:30 p.m.

Find more details, such as parking information, here. Guests are encouraged to register beforehand, but can also sign in before the lecture.