Science Pub: Astronomy

Tonight we went to Science Pub to hear a recently hired UO astronomer tell us about the future of astronomy in Oregon. I’m afraid he was very rambling and had too much to say off-topic, such as his experience in getting photographed with the UO mascot, but his work in Hawai’i was interesting. During the Q&A, J. asked a question that led to the most interesting information of the evening – how did they keep the 30’ mirror in the Gemini telescope clean? It turns out that they regularly rotated the telescope so that the mirror was basically standing on edge, above the floor, and then they lowered a guy down from above with a can of dry ice. He’d spray the entire surface of the mirror, and the dust would all bond to the CO2 and then, when the CO2 sublimated, the dust would fall to the ground, and they’d clean it up with a shop vac.