Human beings were once fascinated with the concept of
living under an infinite, unchanging blanket of stars. But like
their audience of humans, stars are not immortal. Their fragile
existence will be explained in free public lectures at NASA’s
Jet Propulsion Laboratory on Thursday, Oct. 17, and at Pasadena
City College on Friday, Oct. 18.

The lectures, entitled “A Billion Suns: The Lives and Deaths
of the Stars,” begin at 7 p.m. Seating is on a first-come, first-
serve basis. The lecture will also be webcast live on Thurs., Oct.
17, at 7 p.m. Pacific time at
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/events/lectures/oct02.html , and will be
archived online for later viewing.

Presenting the lecture will be Dr. Michelle Thaller, an
astronomer at the California Institute of Technology in
Pasadena. Thaller will discuss how new stars emerge from giant
clouds of dust and gas in our galaxy, unravel into nebulae and
often die in violent explosions. She will also talk about the
mysterious afterlife of stars, including the fact that most of
the atoms in the human body were originally formed in the
nuclear furnace of a burning star. We are literally made of
stardust!

Thaller has been involved with many NASA media and public
outreach efforts. She currently does research for NASA’s Space
Infrared Telescope Facility, an orbiting observatory due to
launch in January 2003. The JPL-managed mission will complete
NASA’s fleet of Great Observatories (the others are the Hubble,
Chandra, and Compton Gamma Ray Telescopes). Among other things,
it will observe planetary systems forming around other stars,
and it will study the era when galaxies were just starting to
form in the universe.

The lecture at JPL, located at 4800 Oak Grove Dr.,
Pasadena, off the Oak Grove Drive exit of the 210 (Foothill)
freeway, will be held in the von Karman Auditorium. The Friday
lecture will be held in Pasadena City College’s Vosloh Forum at
1570 E. Colorado Blvd. For more information, call (818) 354-0112
or see http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/events/lectures.html .

JPL is a division of the California Institute of
Technology.