astronomy

Pamela L. Gay

Pamela L. Gay is a astronomy topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Pamela L. Gay rather than just read about it. In short: Pamela L. Gay (born December 12, 1973) is an American astronomer, educator, podcaster, and writer, best known for her work in astronomical podcasting and citizen science astronomy projects.

Key takeaways

Pamela L. Gay belongs to astronomy; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Pamela L. Gay to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Pamela L. Gay from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Pamela L. Gay (born December 12, 1973) is an American astronomer, educator, podcaster, and writer, best known for her work in astronomical podcasting and citizen science astronomy projects. She is a senior education and communication specialist and senior scientist for the Planetary Science Institute. Her research interests include analysis of astronomy data, as well as examination of the impact of citizen science initiatives. Gay has also appeared as herself in various television documentary series. Gay takes part in science popularization efforts and educational outreach as director of CosmoQuest, a citizen science project aimed at engaging the public in astronomy research, speaking on science and scientific skepticism topics internationally, and through educational podcasting.

Early life and career Gay was born in California and later moved to Westford, Massachusetts, where she attended Westford Academy. Gay received a BS degree in astrophysics from Michigan State University in 1996 and a PhD in astronomy from the University of Texas, Austin, in 2002. She is a senior education and communication specialist and senior scientist for the Planetary Science Institute. Previously, Gay was the director of technology and citizen science for the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, and prior to that, an assistant research professor in the STEM center at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. Gay was on the council (board of directors) for the American Association of Variable Star Observers, as well as its educational committee chair. Gay was co-chair of the United States new media efforts with regard to the International Year of Astronomy, 2009.

Research Gay's research interests focus primarily on motivating science engagement with media and citizen scientists, as well as data analysis and visualization to engage the public as partners in the analysis of large data sets. Other research interests include RR Lyrae stars with which she collaborates with both professional and amateur astronomers across the world to gather needed data. While Gay is known for her citizen science and educational outreach work, much of her research has been in galactic astronomy. Gay's work with David Lambert provided confirmation that magnesium (Mg) isotopes are primarily a product of nucleosynthesis in massive stars, and demonstrated that some stars with known "anomalous or peculiar composition are also marked by distinctive isotopic Mg abundances." Gay and Lambert's results have been further cited in research of properties of the fine-structure constant using absorption systems in the spectra of distant quasars. Gay's work on communication of astronomy has investigated educational trends involving the use of podcasting, using the Slacker Astronomy podcast as a case study. Researchers at the University of Sydney, Australia cited the study, examining podcasting as a means of supporting instruction, leveraging its advantages against student time constraints and potential bandwidth limitations. Gay's work on Exploring the Motivations of Citizen Science Volunteers examined the Zooniverse project, which developed from the Galaxy Zoo initiative, which started in 2007. Researchers citing this study concluded that "[p]ublic response was extremely positive," garnering over 60 million classifications.

CosmoQuest Gay is the Project Director for the citizen science project CosmoQuest. The project is partnered with NASA missions, including NASA's Dawn, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), MESSENGER, and Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) teams, to "build a series of projects that map the surfaces of rocky worlds and explore the atmospheres of planets and small bodies the solar system over." The project provides an interface for users to assist in identification, mapping and characterization of surface features using visual data provided by NASA missions. Crater counting is described as "a valuable exercise, but it's hard to automate." Surface features, such as the size and degradation of craters, are identified by individual users and submitted back to the project, where they are collected alongside the contributions of other citizen scientists. CosmoQuest projects have included Planet Mappers, Moon Mappers, Asteroid Mappers, and a future project, Planet Investigators. A mobile application is available as part of the Moon Mappers project, Moon Mappers Crater Decay. CosmoQuest has also provided workshops for educators as well as online astronomy course curricula.

Educational outreach

Gay takes part in astronomy popularization activities and advocates collaboration "to create a community of science within the public." She is a regular astronomy participant in the Virtual Star Party, a weekly video cast featuring professional and amateur astronomers, which was featured in a documentary by Google released at the company's I/O keynote address in San Francisco in June 2012. Gay also participates in scientific skepticism outreach. In 2011, she was a speaker at The Amaz!ng Meeting (TAM) in Las Vegas, Nevada and participated in a panel alongside Bill Nye, Neil deGrasse Tyson, and others entitled "Our Future in Space," which discussed and debated the role of humans and technology in upcoming space exploration. At TAM 2012, Gay was a main program speaker, in which she advocated for positive action at the level of the individual to effect solutions to discrimination issues and to seize opportunities to promote scientific collaboration. Gay has also written about her experience regarding gender bias in the field of science and academia. Gay has been an astronomy speaker at DragonCon in Atlanta, Georgia in 2012 and 2013, where she presented on multiverses, as well as on the "Limits of Skepticism" as part of a panel discussion with Margaret Downey, Tim Farley, Debbie Goddard, D.J. Grothe, and Massimo Pigliucci.

Podcasting

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Pamela L. Gay

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Pamela L. Gay claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In astronomy, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Pamela L. Gay before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Pamela L. Gay ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Pamela L. Gay

In research: Pamela L. Gay appears in astronomy research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Pamela L. Gay in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Pamela L. Gay is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1973 births, 20th-century American astronomers, 20th-century American non-fiction writers, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Pamela L. Gay outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Pamela L. Gay in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Pamela L. Gay means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Pamela L. Gay out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Pamela L. Gay in simple terms?

Pamela L. Gay (born December 12, 1973) is an American astronomer, educator, podcaster, and writer, best known for her work in astronomical podcasting and citizen science astronomy projects.

Why does Pamela L. Gay matter?

Because it connects several astronomy ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Pamela L. Gay?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Pamela L. Gay.