Nationwide Max Planck Day on 14th September 2018
Gravitational physics workshop for high-school students and public evening lecture on three years of gravitational-wave astronomy in Hanover
On 14th September, the Max Planck Society, Germany's most successful science organization, celebrates three anniversaries: 2018 marks the 160th anniversary of its namesake Max Planck, who received the Nobel Prize in Physics exactly 100 years ago. Also, the Max Planck Society was founded 70 years ago. Throughout Germany, Max Planck Institutes open their doors to all those interested in research and everyone else curious. The Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics (Albert Einstein Institute) in Hannover, which collaborates closely with the Institute for Gravitational Physics at Leibniz Universität Hannover, is also celebrating the three-year anniversary of the first direct measurement of gravitational waves on 14th September 2015.
High-school student workshop
In the morning between 9:00 CEST and 12:00 CEST a workshop on gravitational physics for high-school students from Hanover schools will take place as a closed event. The students from physics courses at the upper secondary school receive an insight into the current state of research on Einstein's gravitational waves.
The program includes a lecture, guided tours through five different laboratories, and a visit to the Atlas supercomputer. The morning will be rounded off by a speed-informing event at which the students will get first-hand information from different students and scientists of the institute in relaxed discussions on how to become a researcher and the daily life of scientists.
Public evening lecture
In the evening at 19:00 CEST, a popular science lecture (in German language) “Eavesdropping on the Universe with Gravitational Waves” will take place at the institute.
On 14th September 2015, a new era of astronomy began: gravitational waves were directly detected for the first time. Since then, the worldwide network of gravitational-wave detectors has measured multiple mergers of black holes and, together with 70 observatories on Earth and in space, observed the merger of a double neutron star for the first time. The lecture gives an overview of what we have learned in the past three years and what the future of gravitational-wave astronomy looks like.
The location for both events is the institute building at Callinstr. 38, 30167 Hannover. Directions can be found at http://www.aei.mpg.de/directions-hannover.
Media representatives are cordially invited to both events. Please contact Dr. Benjamin Knispel in advance.
The nationwide Max Planck Day 2018
The physicist Max Planck asked questions that set the world in motion. His scientific heritage, quantum physics, has changed physics, raised many new questions and made the latest technologies possible.
2018 marks the 160th anniversary of Max Planck's birthday, exactly 100 years ago he received the Nobel Prize in Physics, and 70 years ago the Max Planck Society was founded – Germany's most successful scientific organization.
In the more than 80 Max Planck Institutes, scientists from a wide range of disciplines are now researching at the limits of our current knowledge. Because, as Max Planck said: “The application must be preceded by recognition.”
The nationwide Max Planck Day is aimed at all people interested in research and anyone else who is curious: #wonachsuchstdu invites all visitors to ask their own questions about the research topics of the Max Planck Society, for example at wonachsuchstdu.mpg.de.
