Spectroscopy Society of Pittsburgh Monthly Meeting
RSVP BY: Thursday – October 15 – by NOON
Social Hour: 5:30 PM – Power Center Fides Shepperson Suite
Dinner: 6:30 PM – Power Center Ballroom Section C
Business Meeting: 8:00 PM – Power Center Ballroom Section C
Technical Program Speaker’s Presentation: 8:15 PM – Power Center Ballroom Section C
TECHNICAL FORUM – 5:30 PM
Arthur Glasser, Educator, Senator John Heinz History Center
“The Mystery of the Brashear Time Capsule Revealed!”
In the spring of 2015, a support wall of the abandoned Brashear Optical Shop at 2016 Perrysville Ave. collapsed. The City of Pittsburgh hired a salvager to demolish the unsafe structure. During this work, a steel box that served as a time capsule was discovered. This historical discovery generated a great deal of excitement when the contents of the box were made public. There was a question of ownership of the box and its contents between the salvager and other contending parties. By June, an agreement was reached making the Senator John Heinz History the owner and conservator. This presentation will focus on the contents of the time capsule and what has been learned about Brashear, the Optical Shop, the Brashear family and the Perrysville neighborhood. …Read Bio
TECHNOLOGY PROGRAM – 8:15 PM
Professor William B. McKinnon, Washington University
“NASA’s New Horizons Mission: To Pluto and Beyond!”
After a 9-plus year journey, NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft reached the dwarf planet Pluto on July 14, 2015. Encounter highlights included images, compositional maps (derived from spectroscopy!), atmospheric measurements and more of Pluto, its 5 known moons, and the surrounding space environment. Now, new data are being returned almost every day. Washington University’s William B. McKinnon, Deputy Lead for Geology & Geophysics on the New Horizons Science Team, will describe the latest about this distant mini-planetary system. Plus, he will outline what’s next for the plucky interplanetary explorer.
