ON CAMPUS AT UCI:Observatory leader uses sky as chalkboard

When the phone rings in Tammy Smecker-Hane’s UC Irvine office, it may be a student asking about the distribution of iron abundance in galactic bulge stars or a concerned citizen wondering if that strange green glow in the night sky was caused by a UFO.

No question in the universe, it seems, is off-limits when you’re director of the UCI Observatory and assistant professor of physics. Whether she’s speaking to local third-graders about the solar system or UCI undergraduates about galaxy formation, Smecker-Hane seeks to educate her audience about the heavens above. And that audience is expanding. On the observatory’s visitor nights, the number of people who gather for a close-up view of the sky has increased from about 100 in 1995 to about 1,000 today. People line up to peer through the observatory’s 24-inch and 8.5-inch telescopes, often seeing Saturn’s ethereal rings or Orion Nebula’s star-forming cloud for the first time. To handle the crowds, the department of physics and astronomy has added a team of volunteers and two shuttle buses.

“Nearly everyone loves astronomy, and it’s great publicity for the university,” said Smecker-Hane, who started the visitor nights, which are now held five times a year.

Smecker-Hane especially enjoys getting kids excited about astronomy. The department offers outreach programs for students in the Compton, Santa Ana and Newport-Mesa school districts, inviting them to field trips at the observatory and giving presentations at their schools, often setting up telescopes to view sunspots and solar flares. The program reaches about 2,500 youngsters annually.

As a child, Smecker-Hane learned about the solar system when her parents took her to their local planetarium in Pittsburgh. Smecker-Hane was first in her family to go to college.

She got serious about astronomy as a graduate student at Johns Hopkins University, where she obtained her doctorate in physics in 1993. Today, she studies the formation and evolution of galaxies.

“Astronomy is still a young science,” she says. “It’s a field where one person or a small group of people can still make a huge discovery.”

The next visitor night will be from 8 to 10 p.m. April 13. The event is free; parking is available for $7 in the parking structure at E. Peltason and Anteater Drives, 18C on the campus map at www.uci.edu/campusmap. Shuttle buses will take visitors from the front of the parking structure to the gravel road near Gabrielino Drive and California Avenue that leads to the observatory.

For more information, visit www.physics.uci.edu/{tilde}observat/.

Honoring campus heroes

The UCI Alumni Assn. selected National Medal of Science winner R. Duncan Luce as its Extraordinarius Award recipient — one of 17 honorees to be recognized at its 37th annual Lauds & Laurels Awards ceremony Thursday, May 10, at the Hyatt Regency Irvine.

“Lauds & Laurels” recognizes alumni, colleagues, faculty, staff, students and community friends for their outstanding dedication and commitment to UCI.

For more than 50 years, no scholar has more profoundly influenced the field of mathematical psychology than Luce, professor emeritus of cognitive sciences in the school of social sciences.

Event proceeds fund the alumni association’s undergraduate scholarship program. Individual tickets are $250 and table sponsorships are $2,500 to $10,000.

For more information, call (949) 824-4551 or visit www.alumni.uci.edu.

Camps open house

“Celebrate UCI,” the 29th annual open house that welcomes all to explore the campus and enjoy a day of food, games and entertainment, will be held 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, April 21.

People of all ages, including community members, faculty, staff, alumni, and current and prospective students, are invited to the free event. Among the festivities are an Earth Day Celebration, classic car show and the Wayzgoose Medieval Faire.

Wayzgoose offers more than 100 club and organization booths, children’s carnival rides, boardwalk-style games, a petting zoo, pony rides and more.

Hosted by the UCI Volunteer Center, the Earth Day Celebration will be 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and includes a display of electric vehicles, hands-on educational booths, Earth-friendly vendors and an environmental film festival.

The campus police department will present the ninth annual Car Show on the Green 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Chevys, Fords and other models from various eras will compete in 16 categories, including Best of Show, Best Custom, Best Modified and Most Authentic.

Campus tram tours will be available 10 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. and walking tours 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. Tours include a shuttle trip to the Anteater Recreation Center. General campus offices also will be open.

For more information, call (949) 824-5182 or visit www.uci.edu/celebrate.

Distinguished Fellows

The Chancellor’s Distinguished Fellows Series continues with two events in April.

For more information, call (949) 824-6503 or visit www.chancellor.uci.edu/cdfs.shtml.

Science Café Forum

SoCal Science Café will present a “Science Café Energy Forum: Policy, Alternatives and Solutions” at 3 p.m. Saturday, April 7, at Barnes and Noble, Fashion Island, Newport Beach.

Speakers include Rep. John Campbell (R-Newport Beach); James Maclay, doctoral candidate at the UCI National Fuel Cell Research Center; and Dennis Siebers, Sandia National Laboratories Combustion Research Facility.

The forum is free and open to the public. For details, call (949) 718-0109.

Film and Video Center

UCI’s Film and Video Center continues its 10th anniversary celebration with appearances by “Stranger than Fiction” screenwriter Zach Helm; one of Andy Warhol’s inner circle, Alexis Del Lago; internationally acclaimed composer and author Liu Sola; and writer and director Gina Kim at film screenings and festivals April 5 to May 31.

The center also is co-hosting the Vietnamese International Film Festival, Latin American Film Festival and 15th Annual Festival of Staged Readings of Student Screenplays.

The first film, “Never Forever,” will be shown at 7 p.m. Thursday, April 5. Director/writer Gina Kim will attend the screening and speak about her work. Most films are 35 mm prints presented in the center’s theater at the Lucille Kuehn Auditorium (Room 100) in the Humanities Instructional Building. Ticket prices are $3-$5.

For a schedule of events, visit www.filmandvideocenter.com.