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Silicon
Valley Astronomy
Lecture Series
Celebrating
its 26th anniversary,
Presents
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Dr.
Lindy Elkins-Tanton,
Director of the Space
Sciences Laboratory at
the University of
California, Berkeley,
will give a free,
illustrated,
non-technical lecture
entitled
The
NASA Psyche mission:
First
Journey to an Unknown
World
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Date: Wednesday,
April 8, 2026
Time: 7
PM (PST)
Location: Smithwick
Theater, Foothill
College, Los Altos
Free
Admission
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The
NASA Psyche mission is
on its way to orbit a
small but immensely
ancient world in our
asteroid belt: A
metallic object, the
first humans will ever
have visited. When our
solar system was in
its infancy, thousands
of planetesimals (tiny
planet-like objects)
formed in less than a
million years. (If the
history of the entire
solar system were
compressed to a single
day, the planetesimals
would have formed in
the first 18 seconds!)
Many planetesimals
later melted, allowing
metal cores to form
inside rocky mantles.
One of these metal
cores may be revealed
in the asteroid (16)
Psyche. Dr.
Elkins-Tanton will
discuss what is known
and what is
hypothesized about the
asteroid, explain how
they planned a mission
and built a spacecraft
to study this unknown
object, and update us
of where we are over
two years post-launch.
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Lindy Elkins-Tanton
is a planetary
scientist and the lead
of the NASA Psyche
mission. She is
Director of the
University of
California, Berkeley’s
Space Sciences
Laboratory.
Previously, she was a
Vice President at
Arizona State
University, Director
of the Department of
Terrestrial Magnetism
at the Carnegie
Institution for
Science, and
faculty
at MIT.
Elkins-Tanton's research
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focuses
on the formation and
evolution of rocky
planets, volcanic
activity and
extinctions on Earth,
as well as on building
effective teams and
future-facing
educational practices.
Asteroid (8252)
Elkins-Tanton is named
for her, as is the
mineral
elkinstantonite. She
is a member of the
National Academy of
Sciences, and the
American Academy of
Arts & Sciences.
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The
lecture is
co-sponsored
by:
- Foothill
College
Science, Tech,
Engineering
& Math
Division
- The
SETI Institute
- The
Astronomical
Society of the
Pacific
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Foothill
College is located off
the El Monte Road exit
from Freeway 280 in
Los Altos.
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