Why do you travel? To see amazing sights? To experience new cultures? Or to eat ALL the good food? I travel for all those reasons too but for me as an astrophysicist, my main reason is something known as “astrotourism”. Travelling to see the sights of the night sky that I can’t see from home, either due to the fact that there’s too much light pollution near Oxford or because I can’t see it from home. Like for example the centre of our galaxy the Milky Way, the best view of which is in the southern hemisphere. Or a total solar eclipse where you have to be lucky to be on the path of totality where the Sun and Moon line up *just right*. Or the Northern Lights which can be seen near the Artic Circle as this beautiful dance of light across the sky as oxygen and nitrogen in our atmosphere glow. Do you travel for Astrotourism as well? Where’s next on your bucket list?
👩🏽💻 I’m Dr. Becky Smethurst, an astrophysicist at the University of Oxford (Christ Church). I love making videos about science with an unnatural level of enthusiasm. I like to focus on how we know things, not just what we know. And especially, the things we still don’t know. If you’ve ever wondered about something in space and couldn’t find an answer online - you can ask me! My day job is to do research into how supermassive black holes can affect the galaxies that they live in. In particular, I look at whether the energy output from the disk of material orbiting around a growing supermassive black hole can stop a galaxy from forming stars.g
