Cosmic Videos

The World’s Most Powerful Pair of Eyeglasses:  Keck Adaptive Optics

The World’s Most Powerful Pair of Eyeglasses: Keck Adaptive Optics

Dr. Lyke will give a fun and informative overview of Keck’s productive use of a technology that sharpens its view …
Galaxies Viewed Through Cosmic Magnifying Glasses

Galaxies Viewed Through Cosmic Magnifying Glasses

The gravitational field of massive objects distorts space and time, even acting as a “gravitational lens” by deflecting the path …
Lifting the Fog on the Early Universe

Lifting the Fog on the Early Universe

Just after the Big Bang, the universe was filled with a fog of cool hydrogen gas. When the first stars …
Exploring Galaxies and Beyond

Exploring Galaxies and Beyond

Galaxies turn gas into giant collections of stars that light up the universe.  This simple statement of what happens with …
Cosmic Fireworks

Cosmic Fireworks

Our dynamic universe is adorned by cosmic fireworks: energetic and ephemeral beacons of light that are a million (nova) to …
Decoding the Contents of Distant Galaxies

Decoding the Contents of Distant Galaxies

Our Milky Way is one of countless galaxies in the universe. Understanding the formation and evolution of galaxies remains one …
Using Keck to Explore Planetary Systems Orbiting Nearby Stars

Using Keck to Explore Planetary Systems Orbiting Nearby Stars

The search for extrasolar planets has uncovered a dizzying array of planetary systems.  We have found new planet types — …
Searching for Earth-like Planets with the Keck Planet Finder

Searching for Earth-like Planets with the Keck Planet Finder

The search for extrasolar planets has uncovered a dizzying array of planetary systems.  We have found new planet types — …
Kepler, TESS, and Keck Observatory - Driving Our Understanding of Exoplanetary Systems

Kepler, TESS, and Keck Observatory – Driving Our Understanding of Exoplanetary Systems

Launched in 2009, NASA’s Kepler revolutionized our understanding of other worlds by discovering thousands of exoplanet systems. 10 years after …
Planet Nine from Outer Space

Planet Nine from Outer Space

Five years ago, Dr. Brown and his team proposed that unexpected perturbations to the most distant known objects in our …
SCALES:  A New Keck Instrument for Imaging Exoplanets at 1000 Wavelengths Simultaneously

SCALES: A New Keck Instrument for Imaging Exoplanets at 1000 Wavelengths Simultaneously

Exoplanets are a class of astrophysical objects, like stars and galaxies, where a wide range of detection and characterization methods …
A Night in the Life of Keck Observatory

A Night in the Life of Keck Observatory

You’ve seen the discoveries, but how are they made? In this presentation, we follow the process of Keck Observatory’s science, …

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