Astronomy on Tap Flagstaff | Laboratory Techniques in Astronomy and Planetary Science

Name: Astronomy on Tap Flagstaff | Laboratory Techniques in Astronomy and Planetary Science
Start: 2026-02-24T18:30:00-07:00
Location: Mother Road Brewing Co.

Schedule

Tue, 24 Feb, 2026 at 06:30 pm

UTC-07:00

Location

Mother Road Brewing Co. | Flagstaff, AZ

Join Lowell Observatory and Mother Road Brewing Co. on February 24th at 6:30pm for Astronomy on Tap! Listen to fascinating science talks, play trivia to win out-of-this-world prizes, and of course, enjoy Mother Road brews on tap. Come early, Seats fill up fast!
This month’s speaker is Will Burris who is a Ph.D candidate at Northern Arizona University in the Astronomy and Planetary Science Department. Will be talking about his research in the PEAXS (Processes, Environments, and Astrochemistry on eXtraterrestrial Surfaces) lab in the department of Astronomy and Planetary Science at NAU uses a variety of laboratory techniques to study ices and minerals in the Solar System as well as interstellar space. The lab hosts multiple ultra high vacuum systems capable of reproducing the low pressure and temperature environments of installer space as well as on the surfaces of the Solar System’s moons, asteroids, and comets. In these systems we can grow ices of a variety of molecules (e.g. H2O, CO, CO2) and we can introduce minerals know to exists on asteroids (e.g. olivine’s). We can study these ices and minerals with tools such as Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR), Mass Spectrometry (MS), Mass Gravimetry, and X-Ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS). We can also bombard our ice and mineral samples with electrons using an electron gun, with high energy ions (He and Ar), or laser pulses to simulate UV or Cosmic Ray alteration processes in space. The lab is equipped to explore a variety of different physical scenarios of chemistry and alteration in space to support observational, theoretical, and mission based science.