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Earth's future detectability depends upon the trajectory of our civilization over the coming centuries. Human civilization is also the only known example of an energy-intensive civilization, so our history and future trajectories provide…
This is the written version of an invited review talk for the 13 Feb 2004 AAAS Meeting in Seattle. The talk's goal is to present a philosophical view of extragalactic astronomy as it applies to the sub-field of galaxy evolution. The talk is…
Laboratory astrophysics and complementary theoretical calculations are the foundations of astronomy and astrophysics and will remain so into the foreseeable future. The impact of laboratory astrophysics ranges from the scientific conception…
The beginning of the 21st century marked the "modern era of galaxy surveys" in astronomy. Rapid innovation in observing technology, combined with the base built by galaxy catalogs and atlases dating back centuries, sparked an explosion of…
The discovery of extra-solar planets is one of the greatest achievements of modern astronomy. There are now more than 200 such objects known, and the recent detection of planets with masses approximately 5 times that of Earth demonstrates…
Over the past century, major advances in astronomy and astrophysics have been largely driven by improvements in instrumentation and data collection. With the amassing of high quality data from new telescopes, and especially with the advent…
The next decade of survey astronomy has the potential to transform our knowledge of variable stars. Stellar variability underpins our knowledge of the cosmological distance ladder, and provides direct tests of stellar formation and…
More than 30 years have passed since the Voyager 2 fly-bys of Uranus and Neptune. I discuss a range of lessons learned from Voyager, broadly grouped into process, planning, and people. In terms of process, we must be open to new concepts:…
We are experiencing a period of extreme intellectual effervescence in the area of cosmology. A huge volume of observational data in unprecedented quantity and quality and a more consistent theoretical framework propelled cosmology to an era…
Most major discoveries in astronomy are unplanned, and result from surveying the Universe in a new way, rather than by testing a hypothesis or conducting an investigation with planned outcomes. For example, of the 10 greatest discoveries…
The last two decades have brought spectacular advances in astrophysics of cosmic rays (CRs) and space- and ground-based astronomy. Launches of missions that employ forefront detector technologies enabled measurements with large effective…
A brief summary of some highlights in the study of high energy astrophysical sources over the past decade is presented. It is argued that the great progress that has been made derives largely from the application of new technology to…
How did galaxies form and evolve? This is one of the most challenging questions in astronomy today. Answering it requires a careful combination of observational and theoretical work to reliably determine the observed properties of cosmic…
We report the outcomes of a survey that explores the current practices, needs and expectations of the astrophysics community, concerning four research aspects: open science practices, data access and management, data visualization, and data…
The past few years have seen dramatic breakthroughs and spectacular and puzzling discoveries in astrophysics and cosmology. In many cases, the new observations can only be explained with the introduction of new fundamental physics. Here we…
We now know that the outer solar system is host to at least six diverse planetary ring systems, each of which is a scientifically compelling target with the potential to inform us about the evolution, history and even the internal structure…
The past two decades have seen a tremendous investment in observational facilities that promise to reveal new and unprecedented discoveries about the universe. In comparison, the investment in theoretical work is completely dwarfed, even…
Astronomy has been an inherently visual area of science for millenia, yet a majority of its significant discoveries take place in wavelengths beyond human vision. There are many people, including those with low or no vision, who cannot…
We document how the narrative and the policies of space exploration in the U.S. have changed over the past 50 years. We first examine the history of the U.S. space exploration program and also assess three current conditions of space…
Following several recommendations presented by the Astrophysics Decadal Survey 2010 centered around the need to define "a future ultraviolet-optical space capability," on 2012 May 25, NASA issued a Request for Information (RFI) seeking…