Beyond The Sky!
On the 28th of August the stars had aligned for the students of M.A.H.S.S as one of the leading Indian astrophysicists Dr. Vithal Tilvi was scheduled to deliver a talk. Dr. Vithal Tilvi was part of a team of astronomers who discovered the most distant galaxy in the Universe ever found, and to be addressed by him was an honour for all the students of Mushtifund Aryaan Higher Secondary School present.
Dr Tilvi did his post graduation from Goa University and further studies in Michigan.Presently, Dr Tilvi is working at the Mitchell Institute of Fundamental Physics and Astronomy at Texas A&M University, USA, and is a member of several large international collaborations.
Dr Tilvi was warmly welcomed by the Director Mr Vyankatesh Prabhudesai and introduced by teacher Hetal Gangani. Dr Tilvi began the session by making us appreciate how big the Universe really is. 200 billion stars in every Galaxy, a hundred billion galaxies in the universe and the fact that many more of such universes might exist blew all our minds away. We were left spellbound as he went on to describe how small our planet earth was when compared to the sun, other stars or a Galaxy.
The eager students hung onto his every word as he went on to describe how they had discovered the farthest galaxy. Years of hard work had finally paid off and the astronomers were ecstatic when they made the discovery. Being 13.6 billion light years away, the galaxy was estimated to be formed sometime just after the Big bang. It was very fascinating as Dr. Tilvi made us realise that when we are looking at that galaxy, we are in fact observing how that galaxy was 13.6 billion years ago.
Dr. Tilvi then shared his experiences with working on NASA programs on multiple occasions. He also shed some light on the theory of relativity, the study of “shifting” of electromagnetic radiation to determine the distance of a Galaxy from Earth and also the various shapes of a galaxy. He also talked about the growing scope of research in the field of astronomy in India and the various space missions that India was planning to launch in the near future.
The Question and answer session which followed was entirely co-ordinated by our Director Mr. Vyankatesh Prabhudesai. The inquisitive students asked many questions regarding the expansion of the universe, its origin, travelling faster than the speed of light and also about Black holes and dark matter, all of which Dr Tilvi answered with gusto and patience.
The session, like every other good thing, finally came to an end. But for most of us sitting there this was just the beginning. We were all motivated and inspired to decipher some of the mysteries of the universe, to make an impact and in one way or the other leave our footprint on this planet.
– Prepared by Naivedya Amarnani , Student of STD XII, M.A.H.S.S.