News

Registration for our annual Spring Banquet is still open in the Member Portal, but time is running out!

Sign up now (see below); the deadline is Thursday, February 29th.

When: Sunday, March 10, 2024, 5:30 p.m. to 10:00 p.m.

Where: Embassy Suites DTC, 10250 E Costilla Ave, Centennial, CO 80112

***

This year's Spring Banquet features:

• Social/Cocktail time - Cash bar at 5:30 p.m.
• Awards & New Officer & Trustee Introductions at 6:20 p.m.
• Banquet-style dinner (see below) - at 7:00 p.m.
• Astronomy Presentation by Dr. Jordi Casanova - at 8:00 p.m.
• More social time - until 10:00 p.m. 

Banquet Style Dinner

Starter:

Salad - Spring Mix, Cucumbers, Tomatoes, Carrots, Herbed Croutons served with Ranch and Balsamic Dressing

Entrees (choice of one):

* Chicken Cordon Bleu - Chicken Breast stuffed with Ham & Cheese topped with Garlic Parmesan Sauce

* Lemon Pepper Grilled Salmon with Roasted Asparagus and Wild Rice Pilaf

* Pasta Primavera (Vegetarian) Linguini with Seasonal Vegetables, Tomatoes, and Lemon Thyme Cream Sauce

Dessert:
Cheesecake

Meal price:
$35 per person regardless of entree.

Note: Please email info@denverastro.org if you need your meal to be gluten-free.

Here's a link to the registration page:
https://members.denverastro.org/event-5564369

Spring Banquet Presentation

Speaker:
Dr. Jordi Casanova,
Regis University

Presentation Title:
"The Classical Nova Concert"

Our Speaker:
Dr. Jordi Casanova earned his PhD from the Polytechnic University of Catalonia and is an assistant professor at Regis University. Previously, he has worked at North Carolina State University and Oak Ridge National Laboratory as a post-doctoral researcher. Here in Colorado, he has taught at the Colorado Community College System and at the Metropolitan State University of Denver. He is a theoretical astrophysicist interested in deciphering how stars explode and die.

Presentation:

Classical novae are explosive phenomena that take place in stellar binary systems. They are powered by mass transfer from a low-mass, main-sequence star onto a white dwarf. During these events, material enriched in CNO (carbon-nitrogen-oxygen) and other intermediate-mass elements will be ejected into the interstellar medium. The origin of the metallicity enhancement observed in high-resolution spectra of ejected nova shells has, however, remained unexplained for almost half a century.

Dr. Casanova will present multi-dimensional simulations of classical novae with the FLASH code (an adaptive mesh hydrodynamics code for modeling astrophysical thermonuclear flashes) and discuss the role of Kelvin-Helmholtz instabilities as a natural mechanism for self-enrichment of the accreted envelope with core material. The result is a metallicity enhancement that is consistent with the observed values.