Emma Chapman
@DrEOChapman
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8,387
Following
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Media
864
Statuses
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Author of ‘First Light’, astrophysicist @UniofNottingham , radio astronomer, @royalsociety research fellow. Anti-harassment and equalities campaigner.
Nottingham, England
Joined October 2016
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Pinned Tweet
I never imagined that when I sat down with
@JimSpim
to discuss the possibility of writing a book, that book would end up in The
@washingtonpost
. What a journey!
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Husband said he would take me shopping and buy me something pretty and LOOK WHAT I CHOSE!
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4K
Have coined new word. Snowverreaction: the hysteria felt by Englanders experiencing light snowfall
#Snowmageddon
#snowday
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That tiny, fuzzy red dot is a galaxy as it was 13.1 billion years ago. It is now the farthest galaxy where we know what elements are present.
#JWST
allows first stars scientists like me to understand the chemical evolution of the Universe in exquisite detail. Incredible.
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Is it just me or does this scientific sketch of a nebula from 1850 look like a Studio Ghibli soot spirit?
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I won a grant! It is a relatively "small" one, but it means I can build a small undergrad radio astronomy lab and also hire a postdoc! 🤩
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I fought for 5 years to stay in astronomy and I still regularly see my harasser's name on author lists. It's like a stab in the heart every time. I'm thinking about all the women having to deal with that today... and all the women who have already been pushed out.
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My job is weird. I spent the morning organising outreach to tell people science is amazing and they should come to university. Then at lunchtime I did a media interview highlighting harassment and bullying are endemic within those universities. And I have done no actual research.
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Dorothy Hodgkin, the trailblazing British chemist, was so kickass. At dinner in an Oxford college:
"Is it difficult being a woman scientist?" 🧐
"Not since I won the Nobel Prize" 😑
#WomenInSTEM
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I am honoured and humbled to have been awarded the
@royalsociety
2018 Athena Prize for my work in ending sexual harassment in academia....Okay that was my classy acceptance. LOOK WHAT I WON! LOOK WHAT I WON!
#metoostem
#metoophd
#timesupacademia
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Mother of... check out the artwork for the Ukrainian translation of First Light. I think this is my favourite front cover so far!
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Pfft, when I were an academic, we’d get up at 3am, have a handful of cold gravel for breakfast, get down t’mine where we’d work 24 hours a day for sixpence every six years and we’d STILL publish a paper every day.
Mark Griffiths: the professor who publishes a paper every two days
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I am moved to tears by groundbreaking decision by
@UCL
to break the silence around sexual harassment cases. We fought hard for this step towards fair justice, protection of victims, and placing accountability on institutions.
#metoo
#timesupacademia
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The fingerprints of the first ever stars in the universe, light emitted 13 billions year ago, has been detected! Needs to be independently confirmed for us to be totally convinced as the science behind it is not what we expected at all...
Astronomers detect signal from first stars that lifted Universe out of the dark ages. My piece on some incredible new observations
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I am thrilled to tell you that in October I will be moving to The University of Nottingham Astrophysics Department as a lecturer (once my fellowship is finished). I will be sad to say goodbye to Imperial College, but an exciting adventure lays ahead!
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Clearly NASA spent all of its money on JWST and didn't leave any budget for the hold music.
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Signed a book with tears in my eyes yesterday. The woman, I’d guess around 80 years-old, told me she was so, so proud of me for being a visible woman in sciences, and that she would have taken my path had she had the opportunities.
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I think I accidentally bought a toaster that looks like a Minion….
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The gas in the early Universe appears to have been much colder than we expected, a result which doesn’t fit with any of our standard theoretical models. Could it be dark matter had a larger role than we thought?
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Today I have been modelling how the first black holes and stars ionised the hydrogen left over in the Universe after the Big Bang. From L to R we see the bubbles of burnt away hydrogen growing and merging... signifying the birth of the first stars and galaxies. Fabulous! 🤩
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I received the most touching surprise payment for an outreach talk I did for free yesterday. A prosthetic arm was dedicated in my name and sent to someone in need (I think victims of polio in Africa). This was paid for using the ticket proceeds of my talk. 😭😀
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Galaxies emit a light spectrum, with dark lines indicating chemical elements. These line locations change if the galaxy is moving towards or away from us. Almost every galaxy is flying away from us, one vital piece of evidence that motivated Big Bang theory
#astronomy
#firstlight
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Turns out the boyfriend quite likes me (and I rather like him! ❤️🥰). This man has picked me up off the floor and just held me I cannot tell you how many times in the last year. We met on a mental health course and bonded over Taylor Swift. Love pops up in the oddest of places ☺️
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If you want to know how to make an impact with activism in science, just read this profile of
@jesswade
. Incredible stuff that has resulted in real change. Everyone should
#bemorejess
!
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Wooo
@royalsociety
just gave me an extra three years of funding to keep doing what I'm doing, y'know, just exploring the universe and all.
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Am I the only astrophysicist who wouldn't go to space even for all of the money?
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I just recorded a half-hour lecture for Edinburgh Sci. Festival and the camera only framed me from the nose down. How's your day going?
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You know what I don't miss? Trying to network and present a professional front while standing and eating sub-par finger food from a tiny plate with some ounce of dignity.
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I'm giving a seminar on sexual misconduct to my colleagues today. This is scarier than talking to parliament or doing TV.
You do not want to be seen as the problem in your department, the person that can't take jokes or a behaviour spy. You want to be seen as an astrophysicist.
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Saturn as observed in radio light emitted from ammonia in its atmosphere.
Credit: S. Dagnello (NRAO/AUI/NSF), I. de Pater et al (Berkeley)
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Two thoughts sparked by the recent harassment cases in physics/astro.
1) Do not underestimate the trauma a victim has endured. The articles are shocking... but it was likely much, much worse. Media lawyers are very cautious, and a lot of harassment happens behind closed doors.
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Injustice is hard to let go but well, I’m doing great now. I have a job I love, I’m doing awesome outreach events and writing a book. I help run a campaign group,
@1752Group
, where we are making real headway in preventing the hell I went through from happening again and again.
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Seven years ago I was sexually assaulted. The date around which that happened has been a difficult time for years. This year... I've forgotten the date. I know the general zone of course but the actual date has drifted off along with the (misplaced) shame. Adios bad memories.
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Yes yes yes!
Everyone in STEM should stress this. We have a niche expertise and are not superior to any human in this respect. Worse, this intersects with equal access.
women considered less intelligent + physics is hard = more gender bias
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I just received my book through the post and it is hard to explain my feelings. I’m excited, of course, but also I feel vindicated. I’ve recorded a short clip to explain why. *Now with working audio 🙄*
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A long while ago, a group of us Royal Society Dorothy Hodgkin Fellows argued that it was unfair for our part-time fellowship to have three years less funding than the URF. Today…. IT GOT EQUALISED! Three extra years of funding! Thank you
@royalsociety
, BRAVO!
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Do you remember when it took 3 minutes for your modem to download a jpeg? How the hell have we got to the point where we can wait a few minutes and get an image from a rover that just landed on Mars. Astounding. Look at it! MARS! FROM A ROVER!
#CountdownToMars
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People talk about how harassers shouldn't be punished by losing their careers for good... as if all the women who have left academia haven't experienced exactly that. Punished for being harassed. Punished for speaking out.
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👋Hi lecturers/professors! Your students writing applications for their next position ***is part of their job***. Academia is set up in a crappy way with short-term contracts, so it should bloody well be set up to give them the time to navigate it. Help them, give them time.
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Recently, there’s been a few academic posts extolling 70-hour weeks and no holidays.
Well, it’s Thursday, 4pm, and I’m at the park with my kids. I’m a part-time
@royalsociety
astrophysicist and I’ve never worked more than a 40-hour week. Succeed on your terms.
#WorkLifeBalance
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I had a sexual harasser as an author on one of my papers. His contribution was almost nil (and in fact negative because of the pain he caused). I refused to publish with his name near mine. The journal supported me but it was stressful. Another hidden crappy part of
#astrosh
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A while back, someone connected to my harassment case emailed the Royal Institution, and my fellow panellists, to say that I was a liar and that they would be in the audience watching me. Well, tonight I will give a RI talk about my book. You tried, but you couldn't keep me down.
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It would be easier to be at peace with if I (and some of the other 7 odd complainants) hadn’t suffered intense retaliation for making a complaint, including disturbing phone calls that were reported to the police.
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UCL is not unusual. The policies, the sector culture, is broken. Reputation management is written in stone, zero-tolerance is written in the clouds. So many individuals within UCL wanted to do the right thing but didn't have the power, or those with power, the courage.
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It is the
#InternationalDayOfWomenInScience
. I'm a woman in science. I almost was a woman *not* in science because of the harassment I faced, and the victimisation when I stood up against it. We need these days to gather strength in each other, because the struggle is ongoing.
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A mini-announcement from me... I won't be doing any more media concerning sexual harassment. I thought the triggering aspect would get less with time but it hasn't. It floors me for days, affects my mood for weeks sometimes, even when I feel strong and perfectly able to speak.
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In astronomy, we are used to the idea that blue stars are hotter than red stars. All good, except that taps now confuse me - the colours are the wrong way round!
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Weird to think that, 100 years ago, Edwin Hubble was busy convincing astronomers that the "fuzzy" smudges in the sky were whole other galaxies. Now, our kids get to grow up with this
#JWST
image as the norm, knowing there are hundreds of billions of them out there.
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The verification process behind this result is impressive: the same result was observed with different antennas, different data analysis methods, different times of year, and observations span 2 years.
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Oh my goodness this review is better than I could have hoped for! Stunned.
We review
@DrEOChapman
's debut book, 'First light: Switching on stars at the dawn of time', published by
@sigmascience
this week: or
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I’ve been going through a rough patch and haven’t been on here for quite a while. Sorry to all those I’ve ghosted, delayed and cancelled. About through it now, though, and my “yay life!” present to myself just arrived!
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All the really good photos of observatories are when it’s cloudy. Behind every awe-inspiring image of a telescope is an annoyed astronomer!
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FYI in our house, we are leaving a mince pie for Santa and a KitKat and £10 for Mrs. Claus because... unpaid labour. Excellent time to introduce the concept to the kids (I'm serious).
#Feminist
#Christmas
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Well, it’s officially goodbye to
@imperialcollege
. It’s been an emotional and life changing stay. You took me in at my lowest point, as I battled the trauma and complaint resulting from my
#MeToo
experience. My colleagues saw my tears and terror and didn’t look away.
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I have an army of supporters behind me and, having sued and settled with UCL (thanks
@mco
!), the legal right to talk freely and share the previously confidential documents. The legal arguments didn't just consider his actions harassment but UCL's mishandling as harassment too.
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No one in the world works as hard as
@jesswade
to make physics accessible to everyone. She spends her days, evenings and weekends giving school talks, doing outreach events and writing wikipedia entries for amazing women scientists. Congratulations Jess, you are my inspiration!
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I have received an email from a group of 17-year-olds attempting to replicate the detection of radio light from the spiral arms of the Milky Way using a WOK and $200 of electronics. How awesome are these kids?!
Paper here for anyone that wants to try:
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I am writing a talk on Imposter Syndrome and increasingly feel like I am not qualified enough to be speaking on this.
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If confirmed, this detection will be the first look at the formation of the first stars, with much more excitement to come.
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Yeah... I’m not sure I could love these earrings any more. My love is complete.
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Arecibo is an observatory, with advanced laser facilities and a 12-metre dish. Without government voting rights, Puerto Rico cannot voice the need to save and repair a cutting-edge facility. Write to your representatives. Talk about what the dish did for science. Save Arecibo.
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They listened, believed, and supported me. IC even paid me through my unpaid sick leave, to try and lift some of the injustice and improve my chances of recovery. Well, it worked! I’m off to a lectureship at Nottingham and I’m healthy, made of steel and ready to kick science ass.
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Dug up my old photo of Jocelyn Bell Burnell's radio antennas (left) to mark the first detection of a pulsar
#OTD
in 1967. I found the antenna array by brushing aside an overgrown hedge in Cambridge. I was very affected to see the array reduced to rotting wood and stolen wire.
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The whole process was a two-year shambles. I felt unsafe in my own home, attacked by the rumours my collaborators were hearing & gagged from protecting myself by confidentiality. I was diagnosed with PTSD from the original harassment, compounded by the retaliation & UCL's actions
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I wondered why it was so quiet. The kids have been playing hide and seek but there has been a miscommunication and they are all hiding.
And no, I ain’t going to be the one to tell them. ☕️
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Such a clear, crisp morning. I couldn’t resist getting my Dwarf II telescope out to take a look at the sky. Here’s the Hercules Cluster, a grouping of several hundred thousand stars 22,000 lightyears away. (I’m new at astro photography in the optical, don’t be mean)
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The emails and messages of support I have received have been overwhelming and so gladly received. Each one has lifted me up massively so thank you for taking the time and standing with me. Strength and courage comes in waves and today I borrowed yours.
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2) Do not assume a case is 'in the past'. If we managed to stay in academia, we may still have to work in proximity with our harasser, or fight continuing retaliation, years on. It takes enormous effort just to exist in this space, just to have the right to do our jobs. Still.
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Know an activist in STEM who makes you think "WOW!"?
Consider nominating them for a
@royalsociety
prize, deadline end of Feb. And if you are overloaded and don't have time, DM me and I can pass the names on to the search committee (which I am on).
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These harassers aren't having their lives ruined by trauma, or by justice served. Guess what? They can get another job, just not in the academic world where they caused so much damage. Excuse my French but they can f*%& off.
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Hubble has seen a star as it was 12.9 billion years ago - one of the first stars to exist in the Universe.
And guess whose book on the FIRST STARS is out tomorrow in paperback 🤔? Oh, that would be mine!
Breaking News 📣
#Hubble
breaks new record detecting the most distant individual star ever seen. Nicknamed Earendel by the authors, this star existed within the first billion years after the Universe’s birth in the Big Bang 🎆
Full story: 🔗
Thread 👇
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Getting a sudden flurry of attention regarding the Ukrainian translation of First Light. I'm guessing it might have been reviewed somewhere? Anyone have a link?
Mother of... check out the artwork for the Ukrainian translation of First Light. I think this is my favourite front cover so far!
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House Move Update: We have a house 😲 The buyers turned around today & said oh actually they do have the missing money so clearly were trying to shake us down grr. We’ve lost several thousand on moving & storage fees, and several years of our lives in stress but WE HAVE A HOUSE!
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I’m telling you, the first stars were the best stars! And if you don’t believe me, feel free to pre-order my book on the subject! 🤓
Scientists find that the production of stars in the universe as a whole has been continuously declining over the past 11 billion years, being 30 times lower today than at its likely peak
@d_sobral_
#bicentrivia
Image credit: NOAO/AURA/NSF/N. Smith (University of Arizona)
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👋Hi PhDs/postdocs! Applying for your next position is not an extra-curricular that you magically have time for. ***It is part of your job*** Academia is set up in a crappy way with short-term contracts, so it should bloody well be set up to give you the time to navigate it.
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Holy Guacamole, I have an article in the Guardian!
A star is reborn: how Hubble astronomers saw the earliest light
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Today I am working out how much of the radiation emitted by 1 hydrogen atom 13 billion years ago will fall on to an antenna in Australia.
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Loving all the exoplanet tweeps trying to convince us that their line is just as exciting as the Cliffs of Creation thank you very much.
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Saying that, we always knew the first detection would not be instantaneously met with unanimous applause but would probably require a completely different experiment to double check.
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Glad to see
@newscientist
looking into the burnout of parents and careers during this lockdown. Jobs, homeschooling, pandemic stress = 🤯
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This is the WORST time to be writing a review of the First Stars and Galaxies. I am having to do fricking rewrites daily.
#JWST
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Merry Christmas everyone! It’s the first Christmas after my separation, so I’ve been worried about making it “normal” for the kids. We have had a great day so far though. When life gives you lemons… make a lemon clock!
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I really need to start hearing some positive feelings about being an academic. Even before the pandemic my superiors appeared overworked, exhausted and disillusioned. It makes me not want a permanent position... is there anyone who loves their job?!
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I've done 5 years of harassment outreach and christ was it exhausting and triggering. I am shortly becoming a public engagement chair in physics and can I just say how refreshing it is to be talking SCIENCE that makes me 🐝buzz🐝 with happiness and possibilities.
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So this year started with a two-month-long breakdown and a divorce. Then came months of hard work coming to terms with a bipolar diagnosis that I had been running from for a good decade. Made life changes, made work changes, and am now blossoming in happy, healthy relationships.
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There is a biblical flood of postdoc positions open in astronomy right now. I gotta ask... where did all the previous postholders go? Did we have a mass exodus of postdocs or is there just suddenly a lot more money opening up extra positions?
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Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin was the astronomer that discovered stars are not just hot planets, but are made predominantly of hydrogen.
Edwin Hubble remarked, "she's the best man at Harvard!"
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Today I finalised my contract with
@BloomsburyBooks
@sigmascience
to write a book on the story of the first stars, black holes and galaxies. Working title First Light (or, in my head, What to Expect When You're Expanding). Excited!
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I keep hearing
@UCU
described as the "lecturer's union". It is not. It is for "academics, lecturers, teachers, trainers, instructors, researchers, administrators, managers, computer staff, librarians, postgraduate teaching assistants and other education professionals" in HE.
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Can’t get over the company I am in for the 2020
@womenoffuture
award shortlist. These are some incredible people, I’m spending the next hour finding them all on Twitter!
Thank you so much to
@imperialcollege
@ImperialAstro
for nominating me, it’s an honour to have such support.
We are delighted to announce our incredible 2020 shortlisted candidates
@avivaplc
This year's phenomenal shortlist, celebrates women who are showing what can be achieved through determination and perseverance.
You inspire us 👏
#WOF2020
#rolemodels
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Today I slipped on a poo that my 2 year old had helpfully left on the bathroom floor. So yeah. Loving the work/life balance right now.
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