Are you a GCSE or A-Level student interested in physics? Join us here at King's for our annual physics schools lecture! Professor Giovanna Tinetti will be taking us on a voyage into her ground-breaking research hunting for exoplanets.

Talk title

New worlds in our galaxy.

Talk description

The Earth is special to us – it’s our home. But is it really special as a planet? Every star we can see in the night sky is likely to be orbited by planets. There are probably a thousand billion planets in our galaxy alone. In about thirty years, over 6000 “exoplanets” have been discovered. Some of them are freezing cold, some are so hot that their surface is molten. But beyond that our knowledge falters: What are they made of? How did they form? What’s the weather like there? Are they habitable? The Ariel Space Telescope, to be launched in 2029 as part of the European Space Agency Science Programme, is the first mission dedicated to the determination of the chemical composition of hundreds of exoplanets. Finding out why these new worlds are as they are and what is the Earth’s place in the universe is one of the key challenges of astrophysics, and Ariel will bring a fundamental contribution to addressing this challenge.

About the speaker

Professor Giovanna Tinetti is Vice Dean (Research) for the Faculty of Natural, Mathematical & Engineering Sciences, King’s College London. Professor Tinetti is the Principal Investigator of the European Space Agency’s Ariel - the only space telescope undertaking a comprehensive survey of exoplanets in a wide variety of environments, which will launch in 2029. She is co-founder and co-director of the London Centre for Space Exochemistry Data. She is also co-founder and co-director of Blue Skies Space Ltd, which is developing a new class of satellites to provide high-quality data to the global scientific community.

Giovanna has a PhD in Theoretical Physics from the University of Turin. During her career she has worked at Caltech and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, at the Institute of Astrophysics in Paris, and was the ‘Enrico Fermi’ Chair at La Sapienza, University of Rome. She joined UCL in 2007 as a Royal Society University Research Fellow and she has progressed her career there as Professor of Astrophysics and Head of Astrophysics Group.

 

Schedule

You are welcome to arrive anytime before the theatre talks start at 16:30.

15:15 - Event opens; registration, refreshments and engineering activities

16:15 - Theatre doors open

16:30-16:40 - Theatre event starts; welcome and housekeeping

16:40-17:00 - Research talk from King's Physics PhD student 

17:00-18:00 - Professor Giovanna Tinetti talk and Q&A

18:00 - Event finishes

 

Important information

Attendance
This event is aimed at those aged 16+. Younger attendees are welcome, but please note that attendees under the age of 14 must be accompanied by a responsible adult. For school groups, tickets are limited to 20 students per booking, to ensure a larger number of schools can attend. If you are aged 14–18 and booking for yourself, please check with a parent or guardian before booking your place.

Registration for this event will take place in reception in the main Strand Building entrance. This is on the Strand, the opposite side of St Mary Le Strand Church from Bush House. Refreshments and activities are in the Engineering Quad Labs and the Lecture will take place in the Edmond J. Safra Lecture Theatre.

This event is organised by the Department of Engineering at King’s College London, together with the Faculty Outreach Team. If you have any questions or would like any further details, please email nmes-outreach@kcl.ac.uk.

For in-person events we operate a policy of overbooking, to help manage on the day drop-out rates. Please ensure you arrive in good time to avoid disappointment on the day.

Accessibility
This talk will take place in the Edmond J Safra Lecture Theatre, on the ground floor of the King's Building. The theatre is fully wheelchair accessible, with designated spaces for wheelchair users. There are accessible bathrooms on this floor. The refreshments and activities will take place in the Engineering Quad Labs, on the -1 level of this building.

Wheelchair access is via lift. The nearest step-free underground station is Blackfriars, but a number of bus routes stop a short distance from the Strand Campus.

Photography and privacy notice
The event you will be attending will have photography and/or videography. If you do not wish to appear in any recordings or photographs, please approach our registration team on the day of the event or email nmes-outreach@kcl.ac.uk beforehand. Photographs and recordings taken may feature in our publications or on the King’s website and social media channels. All personal data will be processed in accordance with King’s privacy policy available here.

We collect and process your personal information to help us manage and run the event. In accordance with the King’s College London Data Retention Schedule, we will keep your information until the completion of the event. To find out more about how the university deals with your personal information, including your rights, please see the university’s core privacy notice. Your personal information will be transferred to the United States via Eventbrite. Please read this article where you can find out more on how Eventbrite protects your data.