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Welcome!
Grey Bird Explorations is the restart of my online presence after a lengthy hiatus and period of transition. On these pages you will find a diverse and eclectic collection of posts and resources. I hope you find something that intrigues you as much as it does me!
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Gamelan in Bali
Since the spring of 2015 I have been studying and performing Balinese gamelan here in California. Until the end of 2019 I was active with the community ensemble Gamelan Merdu Kumala and also Gamelan Burat Wangi at California Institute for the Arts. In 2022 after my relocation to the Bay Area, I have resumed my…
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Back after a long silence
Since January of this year I’ve been living and working in the San Francisco Bay Area. While I am still significantly involved in the Vera C. Rubin Observatory science collaborations and handling the occasional on-line class, my new position is with the Linac Coherent Light Source at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory. Here’s a short video…
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Webinar: Mapping the Milky Way and Beyond
After a lengthly hiatus I am back on line in the midst of the pandemic and related chaos. On Thursday, 8 October 2020, I presented an invited webinar concerning study of the Milky Way Galaxy structure and evolution at LIneA – Interinstitutional Laboratory of e-Astronomy, based in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. This was live on…
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The NSF Vera C. Rubin Observatory
Under construction in the foothills of the Chilean Andes. Check out this new Promotional Video.
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A Note at the End of Summer
It is now a week into the start of my Fall term at College of the Canyons here in the Santa Clarita Valley. The main campus is just to the east of I-5 (“the 5” in LA speak) and a stone’s throw from the fictional “Wally World” amusement park. After the end of this year,…
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Hawai’i
It was 30 years ago when I first came to the summit of Maunakea. I had just moved to Hilo from Santa Fe, New Mexico having accepted an engineering position with the Caltech Submillimeter Observatory. In the intervening decades I came back and forth to that island, and that mountain, as an engineer and, later,…
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Update on the Astrophysics Front
As an observational astronomer I’ve been mostly focused on the topics of star formation and the interstellar medium within our own galaxy. Here’s a summary of what I’ve been up to recently. In May 2019 elected as co-chair for the LSST Stars, Milky Way, and Local Volume Science Collaboration. The overarching goals of the SMWLV…