Twiglet and Boo's Adventures in MK

Pre-Christmas excitement here. Twiglet and I have had a week of fun and science.  We started on Monday with a trip into to London to the BBC to see a recording of the Infinite Monkey Cage.  This involves queuing outside in the freezing cold so we can get involved in a discussion on the end of humanity! At least Twiglet got me a hot chocolate whilst we were waiting 😉. Tuesday, saw the Institute of Physics lecture at 100 Aker Camp.  It was all about the physics at CERN; how they are making black holes and anti-matter and how they are going to destroy the world, or rather how they are doing none of that.  It was entertaining and interesting, and you can’t beat a little ‘magic’ in a talk.  I love it when people are fascinated by extremely cold superconductors floating magnets (me included).  Then I finished the week off on Friday by returning to London for 100 Years of Astrophysical Jets, at the Royal Astronomical Society; this was a whole day of short talks all about different things to do with jets.   Hare, Joey and myself all met up at the train station in MK and braved the weather and the rush hour to see Tawny give a talk as part of the proceedings.  It was a very informative day and for the most part this little bear understood what was going on.  Overall a very good lead into a week of Christmas treats and pretending to work for the holidays begin - xxx

Sorry for the delay things have been a little hectic here at the House at Boo Corner, but hopefully we are getting back on track.  Last time I mentioned that some active galaxies have jets of relativistic plasma. We don’t really know the mechanisms behind why they occur, it is an area of study. There is a typical classification of jets into two types, FRI and FRII, though part of what Hare is looking at is the fact that it really isn’t so simple.  The FRI’s are brightest at their cores and the FRII’s they are brightest in their lobes.  What the very clever Bear who was working with Tawny previously did with her computer knowledge, was create a Python code which looks for the path travelled by the jet.  What Tawny did was give this code to me; now I may be a bear of slightly more than very little brain, but I don’t know much about Python. It has taken me three weeks of looking at this code and to be fair I know more about it than I did when I started but not much more. What I do know is that I magically (insert the adjective – Googled) removed the errors, add new data and updated it a little! Low and behold I end up with some pretty pictures of jets and lines to show the path possibly travelled.  I have included some above, the darker colours are the less energetic/hot areas and the brighter colours, they are the bright areas.  The red and black lines, those are the pathways travelled.

Right so lets do some science. I have been wrestling with Python for the past couple of weeks and finally have something to show for it.  At the centre of galaxies there is a black hole, and these super massive black holes (SMBH) can release a stream of plasma travelling pretty close to the speed of light. It is these relativistic jets that are the centre of my PhD.  As you can see I have put a picture up for you, You have the black and white, this is what it looks like when you take a picture through a telescope version of one and I have played with the colour to try and give you a feel for how it has brighter areas. These have higher Flux, as it is called, and represent the areas with more energy – hotter, higher radiation ratio, however you want to think of it.  The brightest patches are called Hotspots (I wonder why?), and the poofy areas are the lobes.  Next time I will show some less posh pictures showing the same things but also adding a little more from this code that I have been working with – Boo xxx

Halloween and Fireworks has led to an active week. Twiglet and I bought some chocolates in case trick or treaters turned up at our doorstep. As it is our first All Saint’s Eve in MK we genuinely had no idea what to expect – a stampeding horde of sugared up 4 year olds or a street so quiet we would be throwing chocolates at the tumble weeds? Settling in for the evening we decided to fit the mood with a Lovecraftian game of Elder Signs, not realising that all bar the kitchen lights were off.  If you are going to face the greatest of the Ancient Ones and win, you want atmospheric. Clearly it looked like we were out; our bowl of chocolates sat by the front door unloved as I think maybe 4 gaggles of children and supervisors went past.  But the upside is Cthulhu was defeated and we have chocolates for the rest of the week *win*.  Then Saturday we went with the Bears to the Park to watch the fireworks! Music, explosions and loads of deep fried doughy products; much fun was had by all.  When we got back, to make sure the whole family could enjoy the day, we had sparklers in the garden with Purr-More.  We are really lucky she is completely not bothered by fireworks and likes to watch the pretty lights if she can.  It was very astronomical spelling out Boo and Twiglet in stars - xxx

Apologies for missing last week Twiglet and I travelled back to Breetown in order to allow this bear one last chance to dance in the annual Hobbit Burlesque Performance; a two night spectacle of show songs and rock music and dancing ahoy!  This last week was all back to the grind though, and progress has been made.  Namely much more reading has taken place, and I have even gone so far as to download some data and look at some code.  I have little idea what the code does yet, but that will be next weeks excitement.  In the middle of this week there was a class trip to London.  All us bears packed marmalade sandwiches (mine were honey, but don’t tell anyone 😉) and we trekked off to a training day for 1st year PhD students.  The excitement was tangible as we got on the train and dwindled massively about halfway through the first talk.  After an afternoon of taming snakes on the Woozle (i.e. a Python workshop) we went for a spontaneous trip to 221b Baker Street as suggested by one little bear.  Speaking of the Woozle, it was sent in for brain surgery; completely wiped!  Next week I am going to have to start from scratch and put everything back on it again. Clearly a Mac is not as waterproof as it sounds  - Boo xx

First full week this week. I have managed to get nothing done! I have read the chapters in the book I was asked to read, and one article that resembled more a syrup like substance than reading material.  A lot of this week has been taken up with coffee mornings, seminars and meetings, and though I feel I have improved my knowledge on parent bodies of meteorites and OB associations, this has been somewhat countered by the amount of cake I have eaten.  Maybe someone should do a PhD on it?  Tawny summoned us all to her house for our first group meeting. I got to meet Hare and Joey properly for the first time since my interview, and our bubbly intern came along for the ride.  They explained what they were all up to which, thanks to my reading, I understood about 80% of what they were saying, but I do need to start a Book of Big Words Made Easy. As if that wasn’t enough socialising, there was an opportunity to sign up to clubs around 100 Aker Camp.  I may have signed up to so many emailing lists I will spend all next week deleting myself off them.  I am, however, excited to try the Dance and Theatre Clubs, though I have no idea where I am going to fit in any research over the next three years! – Boo xxx

Twiglet and I moved the contents of The Hobbit-Hole in Breetown down to MK this week and have set up home in the House at Boo’s Corner.  There are boxes everywhere and Purr-More is taking great delight in exploring every corner.  It has been duly noted that she is thoroughly displeased with the new place, and no amount of cardboard fortresses is going to make it acceptable. But they do give her an advantage when pouncing on my ankles. We made the best choice of coming down just before term starts meaning this week has been the first week, and what a week!  Two days of induction… so much information, so little brain space…  Tours around 100 Aker Camp and meeting all the residents (old and new).  Then two days of getting started.  I cleaned up my desk and honey pots in K Sanders and had a couple of meetings with Tawny; I am now set up for much reading and research.  I can’t wait!  You’ll see in the picture that I have a new Woozle, half the excitement over the next few weeks will be training it to do new tricks.  Twiglet thinks it is a very pretty Woozle, I am going to get it a coat and leave it in my backpack till it is potty trained – Boo xxx