ROTARY LUNCHEON: Adrienne Cool - Astronomy

Club member Adrienne Cool, Director of the SF State University Planetarium and Observatory, will describe some exciting recent discoveries in astronomy. She'll talk about the first-ever image of a black hole and the emerging field of gravitational-wave astronomy, some of the research that she and her students are doing at SF State using the Hubble Space Telescope and other orbiting observatories, and the role that SFSU is playing in diversifying STEM fields. She will end her talk with an astronomical perspective on planet Earth.

A native of New York City, Adrienne received her undergraduate degree in physics at Yale. After brief stints in medical imaging and Electrical Engineering, she happened on astronomy – and hasn't looked back. She completed her PhD at Harvard, and a postdoc at UC Berkeley. Since 1996, she has been a faculty member in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at San Francisco State University, where she and her students use space-borne observatories to study ancient star clusters in the Milky Way. She also works to improve the pathway for SF State undergraduates to become high school science teachers.

Each luncheon ticket includes a three-course lunch. Tickets are $40 each; $35 for Club members who register online in advance (online registration closes at 5PM the day before the meeting). Payment by credit card or check is preferred. Tickets available for purchase only at the door.