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Teachable Moments | November 22, 2016
Spacecraft's 'Ring-Grazing' Maneuver to Deliver New Science from Saturn
In the News
Next week, NASA's Cassini spacecraft will go where no spacecraft has gone before when it flies just past the edge of Saturn's main rings. The maneuver is a first for the spacecraft, which has spent more than 12 years orbiting the ringed giant planet. And it's part of a lead-up to a series of increasingly awesome feats that make up the mission's "Grand Finale" ending with Cassini's plunge into Saturn on Sept. 15, 2017.
How They'll Do It
Cassini's ring-grazing orbits, which will take place from late Novemeber 2016 through April 2017, are shown here in tan. The blue lines represent the path that Cassini took in the time leading up to the new orbits during its extended solstice mission. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute | › Larger image
To prepare for the so-called "ring-grazing orbits," which will bring the spacecraft within 56,000 miles (90,000 km) of Saturn, Cassini engineers have been slowly adjusting the spacecraft's orbit since January. They do this by flying Cassini near Saturn's large moon Titan. The moon's gravity pulls on the spacecraft, changing its direction and speed.
On November 29, Cassini will use a big gravitational pull from Titan to get into an orbit that is closer to perpendicular with respect to the rings of Saturn and its equator. This orbit will send the spacecraft slightly higher above and below Saturn's north and south poles, and allow it to get as close as the outer edge of the main rings – a region as of yet unexplored by Cassini.
This graphic illustrates the Cassini spacecraft's trajectory, or flight path, during the final two phases of its mission. The view is toward Saturn as seen from Earth. The 20 ring-grazing orbits are shown in gray; the 22 grand finale orbits are shown in blue. The final partial orbit is colored orange. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute | › Larger image
Why It's Important
Cassini's ring-grazing orbits will allow scientists to see features in Saturn's rings, up close, that they've only been able to observe from afar. The spacecraft will get so close to the rings, in fact, that it will pass through the dusty edges of the F ring, Saturn's narrow, outermost ring. At that distance, Cassini will be able to study the rings like never before.
Among the firsts will be a "taste test" of Saturn's rings from the inside out, during which Cassini will sample the faint gases surrounding the rings as well as the particles that make up the F ring. Cassini will also capture some of the best high-resolution images of the rings, and our best views of the small moons Atlas, Pan, Daphnis and Pandora, which orbit near the rings' outer edges. Finally, the spacecraft will do reconnaissance work needed to safely carry out its next planned maneuver in April 2017, when Cassini is scheduled to fly through the 1,500-mile (2,350-kilometer) gap between Saturn and its rings.
› Read more about what we might learn from Cassini's ring-grazing orbits.
These orbits are a great example of scientific research in action. Much of what scientists will be seeing in detail during these ring-grazing orbits are features that, despite Cassini's 12 years at Saturn, have remained a mystery. These new perspectives could help answer questions scientists have long puzzled over, but they will also certainly lead to new questions to add to our ongoing exploration of the ringed giant.
Teach It
As part of the Cassini Scientist for a Day Essay Contest, students in grades 5-12 will write an essay describing which of these three targets would provide the most interesting scientific results. › Learn more and enter
What better way to share in the excitement of Cassini's exploration than to get students thinking like NASA scientists and writing about their own questions and curiosities?
NASA's Cassini Scientist for a Day Essay Contest, open to students in grades 5-12, encourages students to do just that. Participants research three science and imaging targets and then write an essay on which target would provide the most interesting scientific results, explaining what they hope to learn from the selected target. Winners of the contest will be featured on NASA's Solar System Exploration website and get an opportunity to speak with Cassini scientists and engineers via video conference in the spring.
More information, contest rules and videos can be found here.
The deadline to enter is Feb. 24, 2017.
Explore More
- Find educational lessons and activities about Saturn
- Discover free educational materials and resources about Saturn
- Students can discover more about Saturn with these slideshows, games and videos
- Download this timeline featuring milestones from Cassini's mission at Saturn or explore the interactive version!
- Explore the Cassini mission to Saturn website
- Browse our Cassini news archive
TAGS: Cassini, Saturn's Rings, Saturn, Grand Finale, Spacecraft, Missions, K-12, Lessons, Activities, Language Arts, Science, Essay Contest
Teachable Moments | October 31, 2016
When Computers Were Human
In The News
This week, we celebrate the 80th anniversary of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. JPL was founded long before it became NASA's premier center for robotic exploration of the solar system – and even before the agency existed. In fact, JPL started as the test-bed for some of the earliest rocketry experiments (thus the name "Jet Propulsion Laboratory"). There were a number of factors that conspired to change JPL's focus from rocketry to space exploration. The Space Race and the resulting formation of NASA were two major factors. But also, with its growing expertise in launching rockets to new heights, JPL was anxious to take its experiments even farther. So in 1957, when the Soviet Union won the first leg of the Space Race by placing Sputnik, the first artificial satellite, into Earth orbit, JPL was called into action. A few months later, NASA launched the JPL-built Explorer 1, which became the first U.S. satellite.
Soon, the challenge was to land on the moon – and JPL was once again called to the task. Landing on another planetary body had never been accomplished so, understandably, it took a few tries to get things right. JPL's first attempts at a moon landing with Rangers 1 through 6 all failed for various reasons. Some of the spacecraft flew very near the moon only to miss it by a few hundred kilometers; others met their mark only to have onboard cameras fail. Ranger 7 was the first mission to successfully land on the moon and transmit data, capturing images 1,000-times better than those obtained by ground-based telescopes. It wasn't a particularly soft landing; rather it was a purposeful crash landing, capturing images along the way. But everyone at JPL was thrilled to have hit their target and returned usable data. These data, and those collected by subsequent missions, made possible NASA's later human missions to the moon.
At the same time it was launching the Ranger lunar missions, JPL had also set its sights on venturing even farther into space and began launching a series of missions called Mariner to Venus, Mercury and Mars. It wasn't long before JPL's specialty became creating robotic spacecraft to go not just to the moon, but also where no one had gone before.
Learn more about the history of JPL and the U.S. space program in the video series below. And explore the interactive timeline.
How They Did It
What's often not known is that all the early rocket experiments and later missions to the moon and beyond wouldn't have been possible without a team at JPL known as the human "computers." Most of these human computers were women who either had degrees in mathematics or were simply very good at mathematics. Over the course of time, these women not only performed hundreds of thousands of mathematical calculations crucial to the U.S. space program, but also eventually became some of the first computer programmers at NASA.
In the early days of space exploration, the best mechanical computers were large (the size of a room) and not particularly powerful. Human capabilities were much more powerful for many tasks, including the rapid calculations needed for trajectory analysis and verification, as well as the graphing of data points on trajectories, which made a spacecraft's path easy to see.
One of the human computers' main tasks was computing the planned trajectories, or paths, for a spacecraft based on the vehicle weight, lift capacity of the rocket, and the orbital dynamics of the planets.
When a spacecraft is launched, it begins sending telemetry signals back to Earth. These signals tell engineers information about the spacecraft's location and health. But this information isn't perfectly straightforward. It arrives as a bunch of numbers that need to be combined in formulas along with other constantly changing parameters (such as velocity, vehicle mass and the effect of gravity from nearby bodies) in order to reveal the spacecraft's actual location. Before there were computers (as we know them today) to do these calculations, human computers would feverishly calculate the exact location of the spacecraft as the telemetry came in and compare that to the planned trajectories. Their calculations would reveal whether the spacecraft was on target.
Doing the calculations required to get Explorer 1 into orbit was no small task. Calculating the trajectory for a Ranger crash landing or a Surveyor soft landing on the moon was even more challenging. Once humans were destined to be on board for the Apollo missions, the stakes were even higher. Fortunately, JPL had set the stage developing the techniques – and calculations – necessary to land a robotic spacecraft safely on the moon.
Why It's Important
Today, JPL continues setting the pace for exploration of the solar system using robots to go where humans hope to venture one day, such as Mars. Though trajectory computations are now done using modern day computers, humans are still required to do trajectory analysis and mission planning. Every mission is different, and with new techniques comes new simulation equations that must be developed and computations that must be performed during actual mission events to ensure success. But even now, nothing is fail-proof. Lots of variables can and do influence spaceflight. Arriving safely on another planet millions of miles away isn't easy or taken for granted, but when things go right and we achieve a safe landing, it is definitely cause for celebration.
Teach It
When launching to another planet, we want to take the most efficient route, using the least amount of rocket fuel possible. The early human computers quickly discovered that launching when two planets are closest and using a lot of rocket fuel for the job isn't the best plan.
Use this fascinating bit of history as a real world, advanced algebra and physics lesson with students in this standards-aligned activity that has grades 9-12 calculate the next launch window to Mars!
› Go to the lesson
Explore More
- Meet JPL engineer Sue Finley – Finley started at JPL in 1958 as a human computer and still works at the laboratory.
- Women at JPL website
- JPL History
- JPL 80th Anniversary Article
- JPL Timeline
- JPL 80th Anniversary Video Playlist
- JPL 80th Anniversary Printable Calendar
- Mars in a Minute Video Series
- Stomp Rockets Activity
- Basics of Space Flight Tutorial
TAGS: JPL Anniversary, History, Human Computers, Launch Windows, Algebra, High School
Museum Alliance | October 5, 2016
NASA on Parade at Annual Science Center Conference
Where do museums shop for animatronic dinosaurs? Test out different planetarium formats? Get the latest news on exhibits to rent? The Association of Science-Technology Centers Annual Conference is one place! NASA's Museum Alliance was there to spread the word about the Alliance and all the NASA resources available to science centers, as well as to check in with institutions already featuring NASA content. Here are a few highlights:
NASA's Journey to Mars and Universe of Learning booths were hot spots. Institutes interested in presenting the future of human space exploration, answering big questions about how our universe works, or taking a virtual tour via Eyes on Exoplanets kept the staff busy.
Attendees learned how they could get involved with various NASA programs designed for museums and science centers.
Museums were excited to sign up for the new GLOBE Observer citizen science app and get their guests involved in collecting real Earth data. (But you don't have to be with a museum to use the app or these resources!)
At the Live Demonstration Hour, actor Douglas Coler performed a play about the Gemini 4 spacewalk, which recently earned playwright Chris Bresky from the Adler Planetarium an award from the International Museum Theater Alliance.
Also at the demo hour, the Orlando Science Center's Stephanie Kazmierzak and her four brave volunteers wowed the crowd with this engineering demonstration/party trick.
The agency's Competitive Program for Science Museums, Planetariums, and NASA Visitor Centers provides funding in support of NASA-related content. (Check out the Map of Awardees to see what NASA content might be in a museum near you.) Many of the grantees attended the conference and shared project updates.
The Children's Museum of Indianapolis, for instance, just opened its International Space Station exhibit, Beyond Spaceship Earth, and lets visitors see what its like to be an astronaut. Can't make it to the museum? There's an app for that!
The Discover NASA exhibit for libraries has been reaching about 20,000 people at each site it visits, with hosts putting on all kinds of related special programming. Check out the schedule to see if it's coming to a library near you.
Another awardee, GirlStart, provides students with STEM learning via after school classes, festivals and summer camps. Its DeSTEMber celebration is available for anyone, anytime. The daily hands-on activities are designed for families to do at home, together.
With more than 600 members in nearly 50 countries, the Association of Science-Technology Centers has quite a lot going on. Luckily, there's an online search tool so you can find out what's happening at a member center near you! Maybe you can even see what dinosaur they ended up picking out.
At a museum, science center, library, camp or other informal education institution? Learn how you can join the more than 700 organizations participating in NASA's Museum Alliance, here.
TAGS: Association of Science-Technology Centers, Conference, Museums, Science Centers, Museum Alliance, CP4SMP
Museum Alliance | August 31, 2016
NASA Earth-Science App Wants You
At museums, people can get involved with NASA science and participate in hands-on learning, and now, thanks to a new app from the agency, they can take the experience with them through citizen science.
The GLOBE Observer app invites people of all ages around the world to contribute to the agency's Earth-science missions by making their own observations about the planet to complement those made by satellites. Students and others have already been collecting, sharing, and analyzing Earth data on the GLOBE program website for more than 20 years through schools, museums and after-school programs. The app provides a new way for individuals to join in and add to the data sets of more than 100 million measurements.
The GLOBE Observer app will eventually feature a number of citizen-science projects, but the inaugural project, called GLOBE Clouds, will ask users to collect local data that can help scientists interpret satellite observations of clouds – a critical indicator for understanding climate and climate change. No special knowledge is needed to use the app, but participants will probably learn something new! The app walks users through recording sky conditions and cloud types, plus taking photos of what they see. Future projects on the app will let citizen scientists assist with monitoring land-cover and mosquito populations.
Museums and science organizations are getting involved too by setting up accounts that let teams of citizen scientists collect data on their behalf. In fact, in honor of International Science Center and Science Museum Day (November 10, 2016) people are encouraged to register for the app through their local science institutions to join a worldwide experiment.
Get started using GLOBE Observer by downloading the app, available for iOS and Android devices. Find out more during a Facebook Live event on the NASA Earth page on September 12 at 3:30 p.m. PDT that will introduce the project, the missions it supports and answer audience questions.
At a museum, science center, library, camp or other informal education institution? Learn how to put together your own GLOBE Observer team account here, or how you can join the more than 700 organizations participating in NASA's Museum Alliance here.
TAGS: Citizen Science, Mobile App, Museums, Science Centers, Earth Science
Edu News | August 23, 2016
What We Did Over Your Summer Vacation
This summer, while many of us were sleeping in and avoiding heavy school work, lots of exciting things were happening in and around our solar system! Here's a guide to launching the 2016 school year right and turning those stellar events into educational connections from NASA.
Science on Fire
Here at home, on Earth, it is fire season in many places in the Northern Hemisphere. Fire season comes about with warmer temperatures, dry air, and dry brush. Once a fire gets started in these conditions, it can rapidly spread and become out of control, especially when high winds are involved. This summer has already witnessed some dangerous fires including the Sand Fire in Southern California and the Soberanes Fire near Big Sur on the Central California coast. Beyond the immediate threat from flames, smoke degrades air quality and burn scars leave hillsides vulnerable to rain-induced mudslides.
NASA satellites and airborne instruments are helping scientists better understand wildfires and their impacts on our changing climate. And in the immediate term, they are helping firefighters track wildfires and respond to people and structures in risk areas.
Check out JPL's latest Teachable Moment to find out more about how scientists are studying wildfires, what they're learning and why it's important. And get links to two new lessons for students in grades 3-12 that have students use NASA data, algebra and geometry to approximate burn areas, fire-spread rate and fire intensity. (You can also go straight to the new lessons at: Fired Up Over Math: Studying Wildfires from Space and Pixels on Fire)
And speaking of Earth science, find out how you can get a free bulletin board featuring posters and lithographs about NASA Earth science and missions for your classroom!
Greetings from Jupiter
On July 4, just in time for a fireworks spectacle, the Juno spacecraft went into orbit around Jupiter. Juno launched from Earth aboard a huge rocket and had been hurtling toward Jupiter for nearly five years. Getting into orbit around Jupiter was a real nail-biter here at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (which helps manage the mission) and we are all very happy everything went as planned. Juno's mission is to study the origin, core and magnetic fields of our solar system's largest planet. Juno will orbit Jupiter for only about 20 months before Jupiter's intense radiation environment takes a toll on the spacecraft.
Communicating with a spacecraft as far away as Juno is a challenge that involves a lot of planning and teamwork. Try out this new lesson for young learners that demonstrates this process and provides practice with number concepts, counting and geometry, and data collection in a concrete, active manner.
Wish you had your very own Juno spacecraft you could use to uncover secrets beneath Jupiter? Check out this easy-to-build Juno model that uses household objects and can be used in a game with friends and family!
Explore more about Juno with these related lessons and videos:
Teachable Moments | August 23, 2016
Back-to-School Burn: The Science of Wildfires
In the NewsYou didn't need to check social media, read the newspaper or watch the local news to know that California wildfires were making headlines this summer. Simply looking up at a smoke-filled sky was enough for millions of people in all parts of the state to know there was a fire nearby.
Fueled by high temperatures, low humidity, high winds and five years of vegetation-drying drought, more than 4,800 fires have engulfed 275,000-plus acres across California already this year. And the traditional fire season – the time of year when fires are more likely to start, spread and consume resources – has only just begun.
With wildfires starting earlier in the year and continuing to ignite throughout all seasons, fire season is now a year-round affair not just in California, but also around the world. In fact, the U.S. Forest Service found that fire seasons have grown longer in 25 percent of Earth's vegetation-covered areas.
For NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which is located in Southern California, the fires cropping up near and far are a constant reminder that its efforts to study wildfires around the world from space, the air and on the ground are as important as ever.
JPL uses a suite of Earth satellites and airborne instruments to help better understand fires and aide in fire management and mitigation. By looking at multiple images and types of data from these instruments, scientists compare what a region looked like before, during and after a fire, as well as how long the area takes to recover.
While the fire is burning, scientists watch its behavior from an aerial perspective to get a big-picture view of the fire itself and the air pollution it is generating in the form of smoke filled with carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide.
Natasha Stavros, a wildfire expert at JPL, joined Zach Tane with the U.S. Forest Service during a Facebook Live event (viewable below) to discuss some of these technologies and how they're used to understand wildfire behavior and improve wildfire recovery.
This animation shows how FireSat would use a network of satellites around the Earth to detect fires faster than ever before.
Additionally, JPL is working with a startup in San Francisco called Quadra Pi R2E to develop FireSat, a global network of satellites designed to detect wildfires and alert firefighting crews faster. When completed in June 2018, the network's array of more than 200 satellites will use infrared sensors to detect fires around the world much faster than is possible today. Working 24 hours a day, the satellites will be able to automatically detect fires as small as 35 to 50 feet wide within 15 minutes of when they begin. And within three minutes of a fire being detected, the FireSat network will notify emergency responders in the area.
Using these technologies, NASA scientists are gaining a broader understanding of fires and their impacts.
Why It's Important
One of the ways we often hear wildfires classified is by how much area they have burned. Though this is certainly of some importance, of greater significance to fire scientists is the severity of the fire. Wildfires are classified as burning at different levels of severity: low, medium, and high. Severity is a function of intensity, or how hot the fire was, and its spread rate, or the speed at which it travels. A high-severity fire is going to do some real damage. (Severity is measured by the damage left after the fire, but can be estimated during a fire event by calculating spread rate and measuring flame height which indicates intensity.)
The impacts of wildfires range from the immediate and tangible to the delayed and less obvious. The potential for loss of life, property and natural areas is one of the first threats that wildfires pose. From a financial standpoint, fires can lead to a downturn in local economies due to loss of tourism and business, high costs related to infrastructure restoration, and impacts to federal and state budgets.
The release of greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide is also an important consideration when thinking about the impacts of wildfires. Using NASA satellite data, researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, determined that between 2001 and 2010, California wildfires emitted about 46 million tons of carbon, around five to seven percent of all carbon emitted by the state during that time period.
In California and the western United States, longer fire seasons are linked to changes in spring rains, vapor pressure and snowmelt – all of which have been connected to climate change. Wildfires serve as a climate feedback loop, meaning certain effects of wildfires – the release of CO2 and CO – contribute to climate change, thereby enhancing the factors that contribute to longer and stronger fire seasons.
While this may seem like a grim outlook, it's worth noting that California forests still act as carbon sinks – natural environments that are capable of absorbing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. In certain parts of the state, each hectare of redwood forest is able to store the annual greenhouse gas output of 500 Americans.
Studying and managing wildfires is important for maintaining resources, protecting people, properties and ecosystems, and reducing air pollution, which is why JPL, NASA and other agencies are continuing their study of these threats and developing technologies to better understand them.
Teach It
Have your students try their hands at solving some of the same fire-science problems that NASA scientists do with these two lessons that get students in grades 3 through 12 using NASA data, algebra and geometry to approximate burn areas, fire-spread rate and fire intensity:
- Fired Up Over Math: Studying Wildfires from Space - In this activity, younger students use arithmetic, scale, and math tiles; middle school students employ rate and partial polygon area formulas; and high school students use Google Earth software embedded with recent NASA wildfire data to make inferences about fire severity.
- Pixels on Fire – In this technology-based lesson, students detect mock fires using mobile devices and study NASA data visualizations to determine when actual California wildfires started.
Explore More
- NASA/JPL FireSat Press Release
- SciJinks: Can Meteorologists Help Fight Wildfires?
- Soberanes Fire: Image Captured by NASA's Terra Spacecraft
- Let's Clear the Air: The Danger of Forest Fire Smoke to Firefighters
Lyle Tavernier was a co-author on this feature.
TAGS: teachable moments, wildfires, science
Edu News | August 23, 2016
Free Earth Science Bulletin Board for Educators
UPDATE - Sept. 13, 2016: Our Earth Science Bulletin Board materials are out of stock. To download and print out the resources, click on the links next to each product.
Climate change is a hot topic and one that's become a key part of science education. Introduce students to NASA's climate-science research and Earth satellites with this free bulletin board from the Educator Resource Center at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. The set of posters, lithographs and stickers helps visually engage students while teaching them about topics such as sea-level rise, clouds and greenhouse gases. Note:Materials are available on a first-come-first-served basis.
The Earth Science Bulletin Board includes:
This poster describes the science behind sea-level rise, who's affected and what NASA is doing to help.
Earth's Carbon is Off Balance Mini Poster
See what NASA scientists are doing to understand if our land and ocean can continue to absorb carbon dioxide at the current rate – and for how long.
Get fun facts about Earth science on this two-sided lithograph featuring a stunning image of our home planet.
This poster illustrates how NASA satellites study clouds from space.
Additional materials may include rulers, stickers and lithographs featuring NASA Earth science missions.
Meet JPL Interns | August 22, 2016
Paving a Pathway to Diversity at NASA and JPL
Brandon Murphy's family was well accustomed to his months-long jaunts to Virginia, Florida and Texas, the home of whichever NASA facility had offered him an internship that semester. Freshly inspired and equipped with new skills, yet a little homesick, Murphy always returned to North Carolina, where he'd lived and gone to school since the age of 12.
But when his fifth NASA internship rolled around in the spring of 2016, a dream opportunity at the agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, Murphy sat his family down and told them he wouldn't be coming home this time.
"I packed up my entire house, put it on the back of a truck, and had them ship it here. Then I drove 36 hours from North Carolina to California in El Niño," said Murphy, who at the time was still finishing up his master's in computer science at North Carolina A&T State University.
A few years earlier, in the hope of improving his career prospects and "making a difference in the world," Murphy had set his sights firmly on finding an internship – and eventually, a career – at NASA. When shortly after applying for an internship he got a call from the agency's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia, he couldn't believe it. "At first I thought they were joking. I was like, you're kidding me. You said NASA, right?"
He accepted almost immediately and spent the next four months developing visualizations and software for an airborne mapping instrument. It didn't take long before he was hooked. "Ever since [that first internship], I applied at NASA every semester and some opportunities showed up that I didn't even apply for," said Murphy.
So when he got an internship offer from his top choice, JPL, with just months to go before earning his degree, Murphy decided to risk it all. "I just took a risk and said, I'm going to come to JPL, put my best foot forward and fingers crossed a full-time position opens up for me."
His parents, military veterans who had tried to instill the values of minimizing risk were understandably worried. But six months after arriving at JPL, and on the eve of his sixth and final internship, Murphy got the position he was waiting for: a full-time gig in JPL's cyber security group hunting for threats to the laboratory's systems and developing defenses against them.
Diversity in the Pipeline
Murphy's story is exactly the kind Jenny Tieu is hoping to see more of at JPL. As one of several program coordinators in the laboratory's Education Office, which brings hundreds of interns and fellows to JPL each year, Tieu focuses specifically on reaching underrepresented students, like Murphy, and bringing them into NASA's pipeline – a cadre of workshops, internships and professional development designed to produce the next generation of scientists and engineers.
Internships are an important piece of that pipeline, providing hands-on experience and a foot in the door. Once in the pipeline, students are more likely to end up with a career at a NASA center. This year, for example, close to half of JPL's new employees who recently graduated from college started at the laboratory as interns or fellows, a new record.
But more than just shape the workforce that will design the spacecraft of the future and explore new worlds, the pipeline is, "a great opportunity to cultivate a community of diverse thinkers and innovators who bring unique perspectives from a multitude of backgrounds," said Tieu.
Promoting diversity in the pipeline involves a number of strategies by JPL and other NASA centers to reach out to schools that enroll high numbers of students who aren't typically well represented in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM), and partner with organizations working to get students involved in those fields.
One agency-wide program, the Minority University Research and Education Project, or MUREP, is what gave Murphy a chance to explore several careers at NASA – and helped him stand out.
"The combination of all the experiences and opportunities that Brandon had at different NASA centers really helped solidify his experience and make him a prime candidate for a full-time position," said Tieu. "This is really the work of the MUREP community coming together as a team to provide opportunities and prepare students for the workforce."
Creating diversity is not without its challenges, though. Perhaps the biggest hurdle is simply making sure students know that opportunities exist for them at NASA. The Education Office and its counterparts across the agency are constantly in search of new ways to reach out to students and encourage them to apply.
In his own way, Murphy is too. He says of his six internships, it was important for him to not only do well for himself, but also for his school, a Historically Black College and University (HBCU), so places like NASA would continue to seek out interns there. Already that attitude has paid off for at least one classmate who recently stopped Murphy in the school's computer lab to thank him for setting a good example.
"He said, 'I just wanted to thank you, because when [NASA Johnson Space Center] called to offer me an internship, they said that because of the work you did, they sought other students from A&T,'" said Murphy. "I was like, wow. He's really going to get an opportunity to experience the great things that I experienced because I got there and put my best foot forward."
When the Pipeline Ends?
The ultimate goal of the pipeline is to turn students who are interested in STEM into scientists and engineers. But what happens once the former interns are hired comes down to efforts at each NASA center to wrap them into the unique culture.
In recent years, JPL has built a strong supportive community for employees who are new to the professional world, offering mentorship and networking opportunities that help with retention. Meanwhile, Tieu and others in the Education Office stay connected with former interns and provide them with resources and help from support groups.
So far, for Murphy, who just started his full-time job last week, it feels like everything fits just right. "This is the place that I really feel comfortable in the work that I'm doing and I see the overall goal, the bigger picture," said Murphy. "If this is how work is going to be for the rest of my career, I could get used to this."
His parents have gotten used to it, too. "My mom's really spilling it all out on Facebook, so I know she's proud of me," said Murphy.
Explore our Intern page to learn more about opportunities at JPL and NASA, and apply.
See stories and photos from JPL interns and fellows:
TAGS: Internships, Fellowships, Programs, MUREP, NASA
Find Your Place at JPL | July 28, 2016
They Really Do Exist! NASA's 'Ghostbusters' Bust Myths About Careers in STEM
It's not often that the lead characters in a blockbuster film have careers as particle physicists and nuclear engineers – and even less often that those roles are played by women. But the new "Ghostbusters" film, which features an all-female team of scientists and engineers, busts not just ghosts, but also some of the tropes about what it means to work in science, technology, engineering and math. It's an idea that has scientists and engineers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory excited about how it might inspire the next generation.
So if they don't spend their days bustin' ghosts, what do JPL's "Ghostbusters" do? Here are the stories of three women in science and engineering at JPL whose jobs, much like their "Ghosbusters" counterparts', are to explore new realms, battle invisible forces and explain the mysteries around us.
The Leader: Anita Sengupta
Job title:
Project Manager, Cold Atom Laboratory
What she does:
In a team of professional ghost busters, Anita Sengupta would most certainly be the enthusiastic and multi-talented leader. She's already taken on roles developing launch vehicles, the parachute that famously helped land the Mars rover Curiosity, and deep-space propulsion systems for missions to comets and asteroids.
Sengupta and other members of the entry, descent and landing team for NASA's Mars rover Curiosity discuss the nail-biting details of the August 2012 landing.
Most recently, she's carved out a niche as the project manager for an atomic physics mission, called the Cold Atom Laboratory, or CAL.
Since the mission was proposed in 2012, Sengupta has been leading a team of engineers and atomic physicists in developing an instrument that can see the unseen. Their mission is to create an ultra-cold quantum gas called a Bose-Einstein condensate, which is a state of matter that forms only at just above absolute zero. At such low temperatures, matter takes on unique properties that seemingly defy the laws of thermodynamics.
To achieve the feat, the team's device will be installed on the International Space Station in July 2017, where the microgravity of space will keep the Bose-Einstein condensate suspended long enough for scientists to get a look at how it behaves. Observing this behavior could lead to groundbreaking discoveries, not least of which is a better understanding of how complexity arises in the universe. The facility could also provide new insights into gravity, super fluidity and dark-matter detection.
"We are opening the doorway into a new quantum realm, so we actually don't know what we're going to see," said Sengupta. "That's what's so exciting. It's about discovery."
Career trajectory:
Sengupta's career has been defined by her unique ability to take on challenges in new realms of science and engineering. It's a trait that closely mimics the fictional character who inspired her as a child: Doctor Who.
"I saw the character of the doctor, who was this very eccentric, but loving, kind and brilliant person," said Sengupta. "I decided I would like to be a person who travels in space, who understands and can apply all fields of science and engineering. That motivated me to be involved in space exploration and, of course, get my doctorate."
After considering majors in astrophysics, astronomy, biology and aerospace engineering, she settled on aerospace engineering because, she says, "I loved fixing things, and the idea of knowing how to build spacecraft just blew my mind."
She doesn't regret the decision. It seems she would have stretched the boundaries of whichever path she chose. Currently, she's serving multiple leadership roles on the Cold Atom Laboratory team while also teaching astronautical engineering classes as an associate professor at the University of Southern California. And she still manages to carve out time for her other passions, which include driving sport motorcycles, snowboarding and flying planes.
On STEM in pop culture:
"It's important for young people to understand that to be an intellectual or a scientist does not necessarily correspond to being socially awkward or geeky," said Sengupta. "You have all varieties of people. A lot of people at JPL are musicians or athletes or I'm a motorcyclist. There are people who have these hobbies and interests outside of doing something traditionally nerdy, so it's a disservice to STEM to paint people in any particular light."
The Engineer: Luz Maria Martinez Sierra
Job title:
Technologist, Natural Space Environments
What she does:
As a nuclear engineer, Luz Maria Martinez Sierra has never built a ghost-bustin' proton gun, but she does design defenses against invisible forces. In her case, it's protecting spacecraft from the intense radiation around planets like Jupiter.
"Space is a very hostile environment, and there are a lot of particles and radiation that can be very dangerous to the spacecraft," said Martinez Sierra. "It's very important to make sure everything is shielded accordingly, so we run all these simulations to determine, 'Ok, you will need to protect this and you need to make sure this survives by putting it behind the solar panels.'"
Part of Martinez Sierra's work is designing radiation defense systems for spacecraft like the one created for the Juno mission shown in the animation above. Juno arrived at Jupiter on July 4, 2016 and will fly closer to the planet – and its intense radiation – than ever before. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
In addition to shielding spacecraft against radiation, she designs devices that can analyze it to reveal hidden details about planets, moons and other bodies. By looking at the radiation signatures of these bodies, scientists can better understand what they're made of and whether they might be home to, for example, the ingredients for life.
Career trajectory:
To the unacquainted, a career in nuclear engineering might seem oddly specific, but Martinez Sierra is quick to point out just how many applications it has, even just at NASA. Nuclear engineers might design systems to protect astronauts venturing to places like Mars, build instruments to study the sun and other stars, or work with spacecraft powered by radioactive materials.
For her part, the career path evolved through a love of physics that traces back to high school in her native Colombia.
"I always loved science, even at a young age," said Martinez Sierra. "And when I took physics in high school, it just clicked. I loved how everything could be described by physics."
She started attending local astronomy events and later earned a bachelor's and master's degree in engineering physics. In 2014, she was accepted into an internship with the laboratory's Maximizing Student Potential in STEM program, which "taught me how to be part of a working environment, solving problems with a team and making sure that I belonged in this field," she says.
Soon after Martinez Sierra was hired on at JPL, she parlayed her internship experience into a mentorship role with the National Community College Aerospace Scholars program.
"I see myself in them," said Martinez Sierra of the students she mentored during the program. "I was lost. I didn't know what I wanted to study or what I wanted to do in my career or how you go from being in college to being a professional. You don't see that connection easily. It's important to help students realize it's not just magic. You have to pursue it. You have to be proactive."
That she is. On top of her full-time job and serving as an occasional mentor for students, Martinez Sierra is also earning her doctorate in nuclear engineering.
On STEM in pop culture:
"There are so many different types of engineers and scientists, even at JPL," said Martinez Sierra. "But they're always portrayed as the same person in movies and TV shows. I like how in the new 'Ghostbusters' movie, the characters are portrayed as these cool people. They're not boring. They get to play with cool toys and make cool things."
The Scientist: Jean Dickey
Job title:
Scientist, Sea Level and IceWhat she does:
While the applications have evolved over her 36-year career at JPL, Jean Dickey's specialty has always been explaining the mysteries that surround us. Her research focuses on the forces and processes that affect our home planet – everything from Earth's gravity to changes in length-of-day to its evolving climate. She has published more than 70 papers, which include findings of a possible molten core on the moon and a method for predicting the variations in Earth's rotation.
"Right now, I'm looking at changes in sea-level rise using data from the Jason and GRACE Earth satellites. There are pockets of warm ocean that explain why Earth's sea-surface temperature was increasing at a lower rate," said Dickey, referring to a previously unexplained hiatus in the otherwise strong uptick in surface air temperature. "It's because the heat was going down deep in the ocean and was not accounted for."
Data streams in from Earth satellites, airborne missions, and on-the-ground observations, and Dickey's job is to make sense of it all. It's a crucial part of understanding what's happening on our home planet – and beyond.
Career trajectory:
Inspired early on by the success of the Sputnik satellite and the ensuing Space Race, and equipped with an affinity for math and science, Dickey was the only one of six siblings to study science. When she graduated from Rutgers University in 1976 with a doctorate in physics, she was well accustomed to being the only woman in her classes and on research teams, but she never let that fact stop her.
She chose to specialize in high-energy particle physics, because as she describes it, "it was finding the essence, the basic building blocks of the universe. The quirks, colors and flavors."
As a postdoc at Caltech, Dickey analyzed data from particle experiments that were performed at Fermilab, a particle accelerator just outside of Chicago. She studied the dynamics of particle collisions and interpreted the findings, which meant using specialized software to analyze enormous data sets.
After three years at Caltech, she took on a new role at JPL analyzing a much different set of data, but one that was no less intriguing. By studying the round-trip travel time of lasers shot between observatories on Earth and reflectors left on the moon by the Apollo astronauts, Dickey made new discoveries about how the moon oscillates and the Earth rotates, and how small variations can have big impacts on weather, sea level and even space exploration.
It was a big change from particle physics, but Dickey was hooked. "I was fascinated by Earth rotation and the processes ongoing here on Earth." Ever since, her research has revolved around the undulations, variations and wobbles that influence Earth's climate, processes and its place in the solar system.
On STEM in pop culture:
"I like to see women in STEM portrayed as smart, caring people," said Dickey. "I really dislike roles that show women as 'space cadets,' so to speak. I think we should be well represented in movies and in the culture."
TAGS: Ghostbusters, Particle Physics, Nuclear Engineering, Physicist, Engineer, Scientist, STEM Careers, Find Your Place, Cold Atom Laboratory


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Once the epitome of Main Street U.S.A., the United Methodist Church is rapidly becoming an increasingly international family.
Put another way: The church of President Bush and Sen. Hillary Clinton is also the church of Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf.
And as the Liberian president stood before thousands of fellow Methodists gathered here Tuesday (April 29), she presented herself as the personification of the church's global missions and urged a renewed effort to fight poverty in Africa.
Sirleaf, who in 2006 became Africa's first democratically elected female head of state, pointed to Methodists' centuries-old health and education ministries in her West African nation. Methodists built the first secondary school in Liberia, the College of West Africa, of which Sirleaf called herself a proud alumna.
"For more than 175 years, you, the Methodist Church, has stood by and with the Liberian nation," Sirleaf said. "The church must continue to work to assist us meet the challenges for the people of Liberia."
Read it all.
Filed under: * Religion News & Commentary Other Churches Methodist
Posted April 30, 2008 at 5:26 pm [Printer Friendly] [Print w/ comments]
1. Daniel wrote:
Interesting article. The UMC is in meltdown mode and is maybe 10-15 years behind TEC. The big difference is that the UMC bishops have learned from TEC and are stacking the deck to stifle any meaningful orthodox dissent. UMC bishops are a much more compliant and meek bunch than TEC bishops. You will not find one +Iker or +Duncan among them. The General Confernce so far has: raised the retirement age of bishops; elected a bishop-backed, liberal slate of candidates to the Judicial Council, and at the behest of the bishops is voting on whether to do away with the system of guaranteed appointments for elders in full connection. What this means is that if a bishop wants to get rid of a troublesome pastor, all he/she has to do is stick them with an ineffective performance appraisal and then decline to appoint them to a church. Much easier than inhibition and deposition, and just as effective!
As orthodox Anglicans in North America gather steam, there may well be a steady stream of United Methodists coming in the door when they finally wake up to the takeover of their denomination by the hard-left activists. The orthodox Methodists have been just like their orthodox counterparts in TEC; quite polite, willing to engage in meaningful dialog, and respectful of other opinions. It has gotten them to the same place as the orthodox in TEC.April 30, 6:14 pm | [comment link]
2. MattJP wrote:
I'm one of those ex-UMs who is now an Anglican. I was baptized and confirmed in UM churches and just was confirmed in an Anglican congregation a few months ago. I'd like to think that I'm a better Methodist now than I was then since Wesley never left the Church. I have kept up with the latest UM general conference and the news hasn't been very good. I had hoped that the UMC might be swinging back to a more orthodox position but it seems that the "religious left" is more organized and powerful than ever at general conference this year according to friend's blogs who are still in the UMC.April 30, 11:54 pm | [comment link]
3. Jody+ wrote:
I think you're a bit overly negative in your assessment of the orthodox cause within the UMC. If anything the General Conference is only going to become more orthodox in areas of human sexuality as more and more African churches are brought into the fold (Cote De Ivore is coming up next as I understand it). Also, while their Bishops have in large part been no less flaky than TEC Bishops, the UMC does have a separate judicatory body (it doesn't expect it's Bishops to fulfill this role as TEC does) which has upheld the book of Discipline consistently. As a Methodist prof from SMU mentioned in Chicago for the National Workshop on Christian unity, the vote at General Conference has become steadily more and more conservative. I think it's too early to pronounce the orthodox cause in the UMC dead.May 1, 2:38 am | [comment link]
4. Jody+ wrote:
I should have read some of the news from this years General Conference before I posted that last comment. The news about the judicial body is indeed discouraging. Perhaps Daniel was not overly negative, but I think we can still hold out hope.May 1, 2:44 am | [comment link]
5. Jody+ wrote:
This was the steady increase i was referring to:
6. Daniel wrote:
I would like to agree with you, but pending actions, such as splitting off the U.S. branch of United Methodism as it own "Central Conference" seem like a way to dilute the influence of orthodox Methodists in other areas of the world. There also was a contested Judicial Council decision a few months back that kept African representation in the 2008 General Conference below what it would have been based purely on numbers of members in the African annual conferences. I could be wrong, but this certainly seems like the very liberal church bureaucracy in the U.S. striving to minimize the orthodox influence of the African church so the U.S. is free to do whatever it wants. Sound like any other denomination you know whose initials begin with T and end with C?May 1, 11:08 am | [comment link]
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A post from the daily flow of linkage called Fresh Signals, at Coudal.com.


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The Burlington Magazine, March 2015
The eighteenth century in The Burlington:
The Burlington Magazine 157 (March 2015)
• Veronica Maria White, "Guercino's Beggar Holding a Broken Jug: A Drawing from the Gennari Inventory of 1719," pp. 169–71.
• Andrew Hopkins, "Palladio and Scamozzi Drawings in England and Their Talman Marks," pp. 172–80.
• Andrea Tomezzoli, "From Venice to Newport: A Painting by Giambettino Cignaroli Lost and Found," pp. 181–85.
• Simon Watney, Review of Stacy Boldrick, Leslie Brubaker, and Richard Clay, eds., Striking Images: Iconoclasms Past and Present (Ashgate Publishing, 2013), pp. 186–89. Available at The Burlington website for free.
• David Scrase, Review of Laura Giles, Lia Markey, and Claire Van Cleave, eds., Italian Master Drawings from the Princeton University Art Museum (Yale University Press, 2014), pp. 197–98.
• Frances Parton, Review of the exhibition Gold (London: Queen's Gallery, 2014–15), p. 202.
• David Scrase, Review of the exhibition William Blake: Apprentice and Master (Oxford, Ashmolean, 2014–15), pp. 206–07.
The Art Bulletin, December 2014
The eighteenth century in The Art Bulletin:
The Art Bulletin 96 (December 2014)
• Cheng-hua Wang, "Whither Art History? A Global Perspective on Eighteenth-Century Chinese Art and Visual Culture," pp. 379–94.
Here, I endeavor to engage the global turn by exploring the connectedness of the world in art that drew China and Europe together in the eighteenth century. My main purpose is to highlight the new scholarship on the art and visual culture of the High Qing dynasty (ca. 1680s–1795). These recent studies reveal that the extent to which the globalized situation was engaged in the art production of the High Qing court and local societies far exceeds previous expectations. Notwithstanding the revered legacy of traditional research on Sino-European artistic interactions of the early modern period, it did not pay much attention to the multiple routes, channels, and contact zones within a global context, nor did it make in-depth explorations into the agency of the Qing emperors, painters, printmakers, and consumers on the issue of how Qing art adopted European styles. Consequently, these new lines of thought have, on the one hand, increased the importance of the comparatively marginal subfield of early modern Sino-European artistic interactions in the studies of Chinese art and, on the other, generated a major revision—not merely a fine-tuning—of the dominant narrative of High Qing art and visual culture (379) . . .
• Nóra Veszprémi, "The Emptiness behind the Mask: The Second Rococo in Painting in Austria and Hungary," pp. 441–62.
At the time of its revival in mid-nineteenth-century Austria, the Rococo style was suffused with often contradictory meanings. Regarded as both outdated and fashionable, Austrian and French, simple and pompous, superficial and full of spiritual value, it prompted musings on time, history, and national identity. Closely connected to both the decorative arts and the imagery of popular prints, paintings of the Rococo revival often evoked contemporary concerns about the commodification of art in the industrialized modern world. The ambiguous responses engendered by the Rococo gained special significance in the context of the political tension between Austria and Hungary.
• Rebecca Zorach, Review of Andrea Feeser, Maureen Daly Goggin, and Beth Fowkes Tobin, eds., The Materiality of Color: The Production, Circulation, and Application of Dyes and Pigments, 1400–1800 (Ashgate, 2012); and Jeffrey Jerome Cohen, ed., Prismatic Ecology: Ecotheory beyond Green (University of Minnesota Press, 2013), pp. 489–91.
• Brian Kane, Review of Whitney Davis, A General Theory of Visual Culture (Princeton University Press, 2011), pp. 491–93.
The Burlington Magazine, January 2015
The eighteenth century in The Burlington:
The Burlington Magazine 157 (January 2015)
• Marie-Noëlle Grison, "A Newly Discovered Bust of a Woman by Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne," pp. 9–13.
• Giles Waterfield, Review of James Anderson Winn, Queen Anne: Patroness of Arts (Oxford University Press, 2014), p. 35.
• Jörg Garms, Review of Robin Thomas, Architecture and Statecraft: Charles of Bourbon's Naples, 1734–1759 (Penn State University Press, 2013), pp. 35–36.
• Martin Postle, Review of Diana Donald, The Art of Thomas Bewick (Reaktion Books, 2013), pp. 36–37.
Reviewed | Judith Bonner on 'The Coast and the Sea'
Linda S. Ferber, The Coast and the Sea: Marine and Maritime Art in America (New York and London: New-York Historical Society in association with D. Giles Limited, 2014), 104 pages, ISBN 978-1907804311, $30 / £20.
Reviewed for Enfilade by Judith H. Bonner
The New-York Historical Society, that city's oldest museum, is celebrating its recent reopening after its lengthy renovation with a traveling exhibition and accompanying catalogue by Linda S. Ferber.1 The exhibition features more than 60 artworks and artifacts, primarily paintings, including portraits, genre scenes, and marine and maritime scenes. Overall, the images document the development of the New York area with its harbor and its close relationship with the Atlantic Ocean, the great maritime highway for trade and immigration.
Works selected for the exhibition have their origins in the eighteenth century, beginning in 1728 and ending in 1904. Maritime-related artifacts include a vintage spyglass, scrimshaw, snuff boxes, and an 1816 silver presentation soup tureen commemorating acts of bravery during the War of 1812. The provenance of each artwork documents the development of the New-York Historical Society, as well as the city's art collectors, their tastes, and their interests.
The exhibition features work by artists whose names are familiar, as well as those who are unfamiliar. The painters include Thomas Birch, Thomas Buttersworth, Carlton Theodore Chapman, Thomas Cole, Jasper Francis Cropsey, Julian Oliver Davidson, Mauritz Frederick Hendrick De Haas, James Guy Evans, Robert Havell Jr., John Frederick Kensett, Rembrandt Peale, Francis Augustus Silva, and John Vanderlyn.
Several artists had nautical experience that informed their art in subject, rigging, and construction of the vessels. Buttersworth served in the British navy, while De Haas held an artist's commission in the Dutch navy. James Guy Evans possibly served in the American navy. Chapman ran away to sea as a teenager; and Davidson sailed the globe, making sketches that provided visual sources for many years. Evident in these artists' works is their understanding of the action of waves and atmospheric effects over the seas at different times of the day or season.
The marine subjects include frigates engaged in famous sea battles, working vessels and bustling port scenes, marine recreation scenes, portraits of heroic sea captains, and pioneering merchants. Marine scenes focus on recreation, shipwrecks, disasters, and military encounters, particularly those in the War of 1812 and Civil War. The exhibition spreads its reach down the East Coast, swinging farther south to the Battle of Mobile Bay in the Gulf of Mexico and the Battle of Port Hudson up the Mississippi River about 100 miles above New Orleans.
Portraitists range from eighteenth-century painter John Wollaston to early nineteenth-century painters John Vanderlyn and Rembrandt Peale, the latter of whom executed a portrait of naval hero Commodore Stephen Decatur in dress uniform and set against a dramatic stormy sky. Wollaston's circa-1750 portrait of wealthy colonial merchant-shipbuilder Captain John Waddell, who owned a fleet of ships, sets the stage for the succession of ships' portraits seen throughout the catalogue. Early portraits include personages having distinguished careers or an association with maritime enterprises. The sitter is often shown near an open window through which one views a conventionalized seascape or harbor scene with masted vessels. Other sitters are shown with maps, globes, compass, a spyglass, or other maritime instruments.
The catalogue is well researched and documented with a select bibliography. Explanations of the marine scenes are succinct yet vivid; the prose is fluid and often poetic. Ferber distinguishes between marine scenes—which focus on the pure seascape, its coast and environs—and maritime paintings. The latter, Ferber explains, emphasize human activity and other enterprises on shore or at sea. Her knowledge of nautical terminology and national history is evident throughout. She traces visual conventions from their development in seventeenth-century Holland, their passage into the British school of marine painting, and subsequent introduction into English colonies in the New World.
Ferber consistently places artworks within a broader historical context and, when appropriate, within a cultural narrative. Brief biographical sketches of artists trace their artistic development within the maritime tradition. Ferber discusses allegorical themes in paintings, as well as the effect that nostalgic longing for historically simpler times had upon the proliferation and re-creation of popular scenes celebrating heroic national victories and spirited naval encounters.
The book invites readers to the repeated examination of the images, some of which, like those illustrating the America's Cup, are iconic. Truly memorable is a painting by Howard Pyle, A Privateersman Ashore (1893), shown in historically correct clothing and accouterments. The privateer stands near the Battery and Castle Clinton at the time of the War of 1812, posed and preening, with smoke from his cigar curling upward from the corner of his mouth as townspeople in the distance look toward him with disdain. The latter is a comment about the disapprobation citizens held for such freebooters, who preyed upon British ships.
Closing this maritime jaunt through history are two paintings. The first, by Andrew Meyer, shows President Grover Cleveland reviewing a naval parade in New York Harbor as the setting for opening ceremonies of Chicago's Columbian Exposition in 1893, with the Statue of Liberty clearly visible, as though she also stands in review of the parade. Lastly, in 1904 Chapman portrays the Great East River Bridge (now Brooklyn Bridge) over the East River, celebrating New York's location on the rim of the Atlantic, the gateway to America.
1. Venues for exhibition include: The Society of the Four Arts, Palm Beach, Florida (25 January — 9 March 2014); The Baker Museum of Art, Naples, Florida (19 April — 6 July 2014); Portland Museum of Art, Portland, Maine (January — May 2015); The Mattatuck Museum, Waterbury, Connecticut (6 June — 13 September 2015); and The New York State Museum, Albany, New York (24 October 2015 — 22 February 2016).
◊ ◊ ◊ ◊ ◊
Judith H. Bonner is Senior Curator and Curator of Art at The Historic New Orleans Collection.
The Burlington Magazine, July 2014
The eighteenth century in The Burlington:
The Burlington Magazine 156 (July 2014)
• Conor Lucey, "Bas-reliefs after Angelica Kauffman," pp. 440–44.
Plaster reliefs for interiors in Ireland based on designs of the 1770s by Angelica Kaufmann.
• Paul Hetherington and Jane Bradney, "The Architect and the Philhellene: Newly Discovered Designs by John Nash for Frederick North's London House," pp. 445–52.
John Nash's designs (c.1813) for Frederick North's unrealised house on what is now Waterloo Place, London, are published here for the first time.
• Todd Longstaffe-Gowan, Review of Elizabeth McKellar, Landscapes of London: The City, the Country, and the Suburbs, 1660–1840 (Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, 2013), pp. 467–68.
• Xavier F. Salomon, Review of Denis Tod, Giambattista Crosato: Pittore del Rococò Europeo (Scripta Edizioni, 2013), pp. 468–69.
• Philippe Malgouyres, Review of Anne-Lise Desmas, Le Ciseau et la Tiare: Les Sculpteurs dans la Rome des Papes, 1724–1758 (Collection de l'Ecole Française de Rome, 2012), p. 469.
• Richard Edgcumbe, Review of Charles Truman, The Wallace Collection: Catalogue of Gold Boxes (Wallace Collection, 2013), p. 470.
Journal of the History of Collections, July 2014
The eighteenth century in the Journal of the History of Collections (though other pieces for periods both earlier and later will likely also be of interest) . . .
Journal of the History of Collections 26 (July 2014)
Alexander Echlin, "Dynasty, Archaeology and Conservation: The Bourbon Rediscovery of Pompeii and Herculaneum in Eighteenth-Century Naples," pp. 145–59 (first published online 1 April 2014).
The rediscovery of the ancient sites of Pompeii and Herculaneum in the eighteenth century attracted a huge response from contemporary commentators. Many of these, as well as almost all subsequent judgements from historians, are very critical of the Bourbon excavators. Charles, King of Naples, and his team of antiquaries have been depicted as charlatans, treating ancient artefacts and the sites poorly, interested in them only in so far as they glorified their kingdom. In this article it is argued that, with an understanding of contemporary approaches to antiquity and conservation, this verdict on the Bourbons seems unduly harsh. Their archaeological methods and treatment of classical art were typical for the eighteenth century and were, in some ways, progressive. In support of this harsh judgement of Charles, Winckelmann has been portrayed as a savage critic of the excavations; in reality he was kinder to the Bourbons than historians have believed.
Julia Lenaghan, "The Cast Collection of John Sanders, Architect, at the Royal Academy, " pp. 193–205 (first published online 4 November 2013).
John Sanders (1768–1826) was an architect and a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London. He was the first student and a life-long friend of Sir John Soane. In 1817 in retirement he travelled to the Continent, where he studied and recorded with academic zeal the architectural monuments of the classical world which had so influenced his mentor and his world. In Rome he amassed a comprehensive and original collection of plaster casts of 'architectural' details. This collection was purchased by the Royal Academy in 1830, and much of it remains today part of the permanent collection of the Academy. This article presents the history and use of this early, non-figural, collection of plaster casts.
Paulo Oliveira Ramos, "The Royal Decree of 1721 and the Ephemeral Archaeological Collection of the Royal Academy of Portuguese History," pp. 223–27 (first published online 22 January 2014).
In the great Lisbon earthquake of 1755, the palace of the Dukes of Braganza collapsed and its priceless treasures were lost forever. Although the content of its archaeological collection—said to constitute the first Portuguese museum of archaeology—is almost impossible to recover in detail today, the process behind its formation can be glimpsed in the documentary record. Two main aspects have emerged in the course of the present research: on the one hand, the relevance of the Royal Decree of 1721 as a crucial moment in the history of heritage preservation in Portugal and in Europe—and also as the inspiration for the archaeological collection; and, on the other hand, the antiquarian commitment of the Marquis of Abrantes.
Stephen Clarke, "Rosamond's Bower, The Pryor's Bank, and the Long Shadow of Strawberry Hill," pp. 287–306 (first published online 4 March 2014).
The influence of Horace Walpole's Strawberry Hill is traced in the little-known collections created in the 1830s and early 1840s at Rosamond's Bower by the writer and antiquary Thomas Crofton Croker (joint author of the Gooseberry Hall satire of the Strawberry Hill sale of 1842) and by Thomas Baylis and Lechmere Whitmore at The Pryor's Bank, both at Fulham. They were active purchasers at the sale (particularly Baylis), and Walpole's Description of Strawberry Hill is a continuing presence behind Croker's accounts of both collections. Both houses were social spaces, presented for antiquarian display, and in the case of The Pryor's Bank in particular that display was played out in entertainments and Dickensian amateur theatricals. An under-explored element in this combination of collecting, antiquarianism, and jocularity is the Noviomagian Society, an antiquarian dining club of which Croker was a founder and which has connections to both houses.
• Jeremy Coote, Review of Holophusicon: The Leverian Museum – An Eighteenth-Century English Institution of Science, Curiosity, and Art," pp. 317–18 (first published online 18 April 2014).
• Jörg Zutter, Review of Houghton Revisited: The Walpole Masterpieces from Catherine the Great's Hermitage, pp. 319–21 (first published online 11 June 2014).
• Arthur MacGregor, Review of Natural Histories: Extraordinary Rare Book Selections from the American Museum of Natural History Library, pp. 322–23 (first published online 8 May 2014).
• Peter Mason, Review of Historias Naturales: Un Proyecto de Miguel Ángel Blanco, pp. 323–24 (first published online 16 May 2014).
• Charles Sebag-Montefiore, Review of Provenance: An Alternate History of Art, pp. 324–25 (first published online 18 April 2014).
Summer 2014 Issue of the CODART eZine
The 4th issue of the CODART eZine focuses on the eighteenth-century:
CODART eZine 4 (Summer 2014)
• Tom van der Molen, "Editor's Note: Eighteenth-Century Art"
• Gerdien Verschoor, "Welcome: CODART Director Dies under Avalanche of Books"
• Virginie D'haene, "Bruges Artists Abroad: Neoclassicist Drawings in the Printroom of the Groeningemuseum"
• Stefaan Hautekeete, "A Cabinet of the Most Delightful Drawings: Eighteenth-Century Netherlandish Drawings from the Collection of Jean de Grez, To Be Exhibited at the Koninklijke Musea voor Schone Kunsten van België (Royal Museums of Fine Arts in Belgium) in 2016"
• René Dessing, "Historic Country Houses in the Netherlands"
• Silke Gatenbröcker, "Duke Anton Ulrich of Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel: One of the First Collectors of Dutch Paintings outside the Netherlands"
• Jacek Tylicki, "Collecting at the Court of Poland-Lithuania and the Activities of King Stanislaus II August"
• Curator's Interview: Paul Knolle interviewed by Andrea Rousová
• Friends: Brian Capstick interviewed by Gerdien Verschoor
• Rebecca Long, "CODART ZEVENTIEN Congress Review"
About CODART
CODART—the international council for curators of Dutch and Flemish art—aims to further the study, care, accessibility and display of art from the Low Countries in museums around the globe. It serves as a platform for exchange and cooperation between curators from different parts of the world, with different levels of experience, and from different types and sizes of institutions. Our organization stimulates international inter-museum cooperation through a variety of activities, including congresses, focus meetings, publications and our website. By these means CODART strives to solidify the cultural ties between the Netherlands and Flanders, and to make the artistic heritage of these countries accessible to the international art-loving public.
The Burlington Magazine, June 2014
The eighteenth century in The Burlington:
The Burlington Magazine 156 (June 2014)
• Meredith M. Hale, "Amsterdam Broadsheets as Sources for a Painted Screen in Mexico City, c. 1700," pp. 356–64.
European print sources for a twelve-panel screen made in Mexico City (c. 1697–1701).
• Alvar González-Palacios, "Giardini and Passarini: Facts and Hypotheses," pp. 365–75.
New documents on the gold- and silversmith Giovanni Giardini (1646–1721).
• Koenraad Brosens and Guy Delmarcel, "Raphael's Acts of the Apostles: Italians in the Service of the Habsburg Monarchy and the Leyniers Tapestry Workshop, 1725–55," pp. 376–81.
A seven-part series of tapestries made by Daniel Leyniers (1752–54) in the Villa Hugel, Essen, based on Raphael's Acts of the Apostles (woven 1516–21).
• Simon Jervis, Review of the exhibition William Kent: Designing Georgian Britain, pp. 391–94.
• Christopher Baker, Review of Christopher Rowell, ed., Ham House: 400 Years of Collecting and Patronage (The Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art and the National Trust, 2013), pp. 398–99.
• Kate Retford, Review of the exhibition catalogue Moira Goff et al, Georgians Revealed: Life, Style, and the Making of Modern Britain (British Library, 2013), p. 401.
• David Pullins, Review of the exhibition From Watteau to Fragonard: Les Fêtes Galantes, pp. 408–10.
• Philippe Bordes, Review of the exhibition Le Goût de Diderot, pp. 413–15.
The Burlington Magazine, March 2014
The (long) eighteenth century in The Burlington:
The Burlington Magazine 156 (March 2014)
• François Marandet, "The Pool of Bethesda by Louis Chéron: A Modello Discovered at the Wellcome Library, London," pp. 162–63.
An oil-sketch by Louis Chéron in the Wellcome Library, London, is identified as a study for the large painting of the Pool of Bethesda (1683) in S. Pantaleone, Venice.
• Massimo Favilla and Ruggero Rugolo, "A Portrait of a Baby Girl by Lorenzo Tiepolo," pp. 164–69.
An attribution to Lorenzo Tiepolo of a Portrait of a Baby Girl in a High Chair (c.1770–76).
• Jocelyn Anderson, Review of Geoffrey Tyack, ed., John Nash: Architect of the Picturesque (English Heritage, 2013), pp. 175–76.
• Uta Christina Koch, Review of the exhibition Fragonard: Poetry and Passion / Poesie und Leidenschaft, pp. 194–95.
• Francis Russell, Review of the exhibition Pietro Bellotti: Another Canaletto, pp. 198–99.
View: A Festival of Art History
London's View: A Festival of Art History (7–9 February 2014) is the latest example of events that slip by me. For anyone interested, the good news is that events were filmed and could be available online in the near future. Plans are also underway for 2015. Here's the coverage from Apollo Magazine's blog, The Muse Room. -CH
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Digby Warde-Aldam, "Great View: The UK's First Art History Festival," The Muse Room from Apollo Magazine (19 February 2014).
The venue is a large room in London's Institut français, its windows looking out over the crazed Victorian skyline of South Kensington. French academic Frédéric Ogée looks slightly taken aback by the crowd, a mix of all ages that has just filled up every available seat—indeed, staff are starting to turn away latecomers to the lecture he is about to give, a fascinating half-hour examination of 'Englishness' in English art. At the end of the talk, Ogée is forced to cut short the barrage of questions from the audience in order to clear the room for the next speaker on the bill of the Institut's View Festival.
The public interest in the talk shouldn't really be surprising. The View, which had its first edition this month, is Britain's first art history festival—which, taking into account the fact that the UK has festivals dedicated to everything from Heavy Metal to knitting comes as something of a surprise. Given London's position as a global art capital, it seems bizarre that nothing like this has ever taken place in the city before. . .
The full review is available here»