We are working on our lineup of Speakers for this summers 2012 MDSP. If you wish to be a speaker at this years 2012 MDSP, click: here

MDSP Speaker Topics and Bios

See Last Summers 2011 Fantastic Speakers Below.

Thanks to All Our Excellent Speakers for Supporting Astronomy and MDSP!

NASA KEYNOTE SPEAKER Lou Mayo Saturday 4 PM "THE 2012 TRANSIT OF VENUS: LAST IN A LIFETIME" On June 6th, 2012, the planet Venus will make its final trek across the face of the sun as seen from Earth until the year 2117. This historic “Venus Transit”, the last in our lifetime, has captured the imaginations and scientific interest of scientists, politicians, explorers, amateur astronomers, and the general public for almost 400 years, since its first sighting in 1639. Since the advent of the telescope in 1609, there have been only six transits (in pairs) of the sun by Venus, 1631/1639, 1761/1769, and 1874/1882. The seventh occurred in 2004 with its pair in 2012. The transit’s importance lies in both its rarity and the critically important role it played in determining the distance of the Earth from the sun, the “astronomical unit” from which the distances to all the other planets could be derived. NASA Planetary astronomer and columnist, Professor Lou Mayo will take us on a journey that began in antiquity to understand the nature of the universe and the size of space. He will provide historical content for many imaginative and creative investigations into the AU and will discuss the methods used by astronomers past and present to scale the universe. Lou’s talk will culminate with a description of the 2012 Transit of Venus and an outline of NASA’s plans to engage the world in this extraordinary, last in a lifetime event. Lou Mayo Bio Lou Mayo is a planetary scientist and program manager working for Honeywell at the NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center and professor of astronomy at Marymount University. Lou has over 20 years experience supporting NASA space and Earth science missions and data systems. His experience includes 11 years as a member of the Voyager IRIS and Cassini CIRS instrument teams. He has published a number of papers on the atmosphere of Titan focusing on radiative transfer modeling of aerosols and condensates. Lou is a member of the DC Space Grant Consortium and the AAS/Division for Planetary Sciences education committee. He is a frequent author and speaker on topics in astronomy and space physics and was a columnist for Mercury Magazine for three years. Lou runs an international network of after school astronomy clubs and is active in developing nationwide space science education programs for NASA.

"SO WHY WOULD ANYONE WANT TO STUDY ASTRONOMY?" Jeri Jones  Friday 7 PM As astronomy becomes more and more popular throughout our educational system and more people are taking an interest in the science, just why is astronomy interesting? With the every-day changing technology of telescopes seeing further into the universe and theories being developed all of the time, how can a person go wrong? This talk will take a slightly different look at astronomy, much of it on a humorous side, as a young stargazer grew up with a 12.5” 1930’s produced telescope. As years passed, many developments in astronomy began to occur and one had to keep up with the findings. The question is though, just how much of this information can be retained in the human brain and have the ability to adjust to new technologies of telescope usage. You will leave this program with a smile on your face and maybe happy to be an astronomer! ABOUT THE SPEAKER Jeri Jones is the Program Coordinator of York County Parks and founder of the York County Astronomical Society. Jeri’s interest in astronomy almost gained him a degree in the science, but Catawba College in Salisbury, North Carolina did not have such a major. He majored in geology so his interests are either looking up or down. He is also the owner of Jones Geological Services in Spring Grove, PA where he conducts educational programs in geology and astronomy throughout the Mid-Atlantic states. Jeri is the first to admit that science is boring unless you add humor to it. Jeri has been blessed with making lots of friends in the astronomy world who has added to his knowledge of the skies. Between doing programming with the Parks, he teaches at Penn State-York OLLI program and researches the geology of southeastern Pennsylvania. His email is jonesgeo@comcast.net.

"DARK MATTER IS AN ENIGMA" Steve Frey  Saturday 2 PM Synopsis of presentation: Dark matter is an enigma. Comprising a significant portion of the matter-and-energy total in the universe, its composition remains unknown. Recently, a possible answer from the world of the ultra-small has emerged to explain this ultra-large phenomenon. An esoteric radiological transformation process called neutrinoless double-beta decay has been proposed as a foundational marker for the existence of a yet-undetected but massive subatomic particle that could be the essence of dark matter. This presentation explores neutrinoless double-beta decay and its possible use to solve the mystery of dark matter. About the Speaker Steve Frey is a semi-retired, certified radiation health physicist. He holds a master's degree in that field from Purdue University and is an undergraduate of Pennsylvania State University. Over 27 years, Steve has participated in the realms of nuclear power, medical radiation physics, and high-energy particle accelerators, first as a radiological engineer and then in higher management. While serving as the Radiological Control Manager of the 2,000-employee Stanford University Linear Accelerator Center (recently renamed the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory), Steve became deeply interested in astrophysics and cosmology. Steve returned to his hometown of South Williamsport, PA in 2008. There he continues to serve his profession as a consultant while enjoying the magnificent nighttime skies of Central Pennsylvania.

Radio Astronomy Kerry Smith  Saturday 3 PM Presentation on Radio Astronomy. Presentation: "Amateur Radio Astronomy" Come and take a journey into the invisible world of radio astronomy and experience what amateur radio astronomers such as Kerry Smith are observing even with the simplest of radio telescopes. We will go back in time to see how this fascinating science got it’s start, learn how radio telescopes work and end the presentation on what can we as amateurs do to contribute to this unique kind of astronomy. Bio on Kerry L. Smith: Kerry’s passion for radio astronomy began in 1989 when he saw that years December issue of a Sky & Telescope article about listening to Jupiter on a short-wave radio. Being a ham radio operator and having an interest in astronomy the article aroused his curiosity. Already equipped with the necessary radio receiver Kerry constructed the articles antenna to listen in on Jupiter’s natural radio emissions and successfully detected them in February 1990. Two months later he joined the Society of Amateur Radio Astronomers and has been an active member since. Kerry has served as the society vice president and is currently serving his 6th term on the board of directors. He is also chairman of the SARA grant committee that supports radio astronomy outreach programs. Kerry’s current interest are radio astronomy outreach and solar flare detection using VLF radio observations.