UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Theoretical astrophysicist and popular science writer Katie Mack will present the spring 2023 Science Achievement Graduate Fellows (SAGF) Lecture at 1 p.m. Monday, Jan. 23, in Paterno Library's Foster Auditorium on the Penn State University Park campus. This free public lecture, titled “Physics at the End of the Universe,” is sponsored by the Penn State Eberly College of Science with funds from the Russell E. Marker Lecture endowment.
Mack’s lecture will share what modern astrophysics predicts about the ultimate fate of the universe and what its destruction might look like. An informal reception will follow the talk in 321 Whitmore Lab.
Mack is a theoretical astrophysicist who currently holds the Hawking Chair in Cosmology and Science Communication at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Canada. Her research explores a range of questions in cosmology — the study of the universe from beginning to end — including those related to dark matter and the early universe. She is also interested in making physics more accessible to the general public and recently authored the book “The End of Everything (Astrophysically Speaking).” She has written for a number of popular publications, such as Scientific American, Slate, Sky & Telescope, Time, and Cosmos magazine, and can be found on Twitter as @AstroKatie.
About the SAGF Lectures
The Science Achievement Graduate Fellows (SAGF) Lectures feature distinguished speakers in science and mathematics and are an outreach of the SAGF scholarship program in the Eberly College of Science at Penn State.
Established in 2018, the SAGF scholarships are awarded annually to outstanding graduate students seeking a doctoral degree in each of the college's seven departments and who are interested in the advancement of women and gender-diverse individuals in the sciences and related fields. The SAGF scholarships recognize women and gender-diverse individuals — both underrepresented groups in the sciences and mathematics — who have a record of significant professional achievements in their field and who are role models for the students in the college. Each scholarship is named in honor of an outstanding woman scientist or mathematician who not only made groundbreaking discoveries but also blazed the trail for others who have followed in their footsteps. The program Fellows host two distinguished lectures a year to honor the women scientists for whom the scholarships are named.
About the Marker Lectures
The Marker lectures were established in 1984 through a gift from Russell Earl Marker, professor emeritus of chemistry at Penn State, whose pioneering synthetic methods revolutionized the steroid-hormone industry and opened the door to the current era of hormone therapies, including the birth-control pill. The Marker endowment allows the Penn State Eberly College of Science to present annual Marker lectures in astronomy and astrophysics, the chemical sciences, evolutionary biology, genetic engineering, the mathematical sciences, and physics.