garik israeliansuperstars of astronomy, astrophysicist at the … · 2015. 2. 16. · garik...

Superstars of Astronomy Page 1 of 24 Garik Israelian, astrophysicist at the Institute of Astrophysics of the Canary Islands

www.Astronomy.com Page 1 of 24

Dave Eicher: Welcome to the Superstars of Astronomy podcast from Astronomy magazine. I’m Dave Eicher, editor in chief of Astronomy, and I want to thank Celestron, manufacturer of superb telescopes, for generously sponsoring this podcast series.

Each month I’ll share the thoughts and research of the world’s

greatest astronomers, astrophysicists, cosmologists and planetary scientists with you in these hour-long chats.

I’m very excited to have a wonderful guest for our second show,

Garik Israelian. Garik is a professor of astronomy at the Institute for Astrophysics on Tenerife in the Canary Islands. His research involves an array of interesting areas interwoven with spectroscopy including extrasolar planets, supernovae, and black holes.

Garik is extremely well-known as the founder and director of the

Starmus Festival, a unique and amazing get-together of astronomy enthusiasts including astronomers, astronaut explorers, musicians, artists, and forward-thinkers of all types.

The second Starmus Festival just occurred this past fall in the

Canaries, and the first took place in 2011. I had the pleasure of participating in Starmus and also working with Garik on the book of speeches from the first conference, and so it’s a real pleasure to welcome you, Garik, for the next hour. Thank you so much for joining me.

Garik Israelian: Thank you Dave. Thanks. Dave Eicher: And you’re a guy who’s working on a lot of things these days —

and we’ll get into some of them — but you’re very, very busy with projects, always on the go, and it amazes me your energy and your involvement in this, that, and everything. And we’ll get to talk of course a lot about Starmus.

But start if you would by telling me a little bit — you were born in

Armenia — tell me a little bit about your background and how you got into astronomy as an interest originally.

Garik Israelian: Well, you know I was a really, really lazy boy at school: no

interest at all in sciences, in math, in physics. Any my physics teacher was so, so tired of me and so that — this is the truth: I mean I was not interested at all in science … I was 17 years old and had no interest. I finished the school with very low marks in math and physics — this is true — so I didn’t know what I was going to do.



And so I went to work in a theater as a worker to put decorations and you know just a worker in a theater. And this one day by chance I went to see a film — a movie — with a friend, and it was a sci-fi movie — it was a Solaris film, the Soviet Russian one, the one made by Tarkovsky.

And I got so excited, the film has just — it took me out of here and

I couldn’t believe it because for me the world was really flat. For me there was nothing interesting in the world. Everything was so standard, so black and white and no colors and everything was so … and then this film has actually shown me that there are so many interesting things in the world — and everything is in space basically.

So if you want to find something exciting and interesting you have

to look for space. And so I decided to open the books of sci-fi and read them because the subject excited me a lot. And the first books I read were Ray Bradbury, Clifford Simak, and Arthur C. Clarke — so I read through all this classical sci-fi literature, and I was literally knocked down by it. I thought it was the best thing I’d ever seen in my life. I was so, so excited by sci-fi literature.

And this is when I decided that astronomy was something that

really seems very interesting and there were so many wonders in the universe that I want to study astronomy. But the difficulty was that I had no knowledge in math and physics, so I had to study alone, and that’s something which I’m really surprised — I still don’t understand how I could do that because my parents were pushing me to find a private — to get private classes in physics and math to prepare for exams at the university.

And fortunately the Soviet system was quite democratic, and so no

matter if you were good or bad at school, as long as you pass your university entrance exams, you are admitted. So basically they didn’t care for your school exams — if you were a good or you were a bad schoolboy — as long as you pass the university exams you are admitted.

So I had to go and study all 10 years of math and physics from

primary school alone. Dave Eicher: This was an enormous effort at this point. Garik Israelian: An enormous effort. So I’m really surprised how could I do it in

one year because in the mean time I was working in the theater and



I was spending six, seven hours every day, all my evenings and nights working on studying physics and math — basically the school subjects. So I had to start from very, very years back to since I was 10 years old because I abandoned basically all the studies, you know? I had to go back very, very, very — but fortunately I did it, and it was really hard.

And thanks to those years and I could overcome all those

difficulties, and I went to university, and the thing is I passed all the university exams with excellent marks. That was again quite shocking because nobody could believe that me being a very bad student at school you could pass university exams with excellent marks, and I did it.

And then I was actually one of the best, best students at the

university in physics. All the lecturers knew me, I got the highest grades, the excellent top marks, and I got to something which they call the “Red Master Degree” which means you have the top marks — and I got one of those.

It was quite a big contrast between me at school and me at the

university, so I turned 180-degree difference. And my physics teachers couldn’t believe that someone like me who was so bad at school could become the best student of the university.

Dave Eicher: Wow, this was really a magical, special year for you. Garik Israelian: Exactly. Dave Eicher: The drive, the inspiration was really the sci-fi hook for you to — Garik Israelian: Absolutely. Sci-fi was a key for inspiring me, and films and books

and so on. And this is one of the reasons I decided to create this Starmus Festival, because I was so convinced that without inspiration — without inspiration you cannot get kids studying serious subjects — science and math, physics and so on. You cannot do it by force. You cannot force them to study. I mean it makes no sense.

They have to be inspired. You have to inspire them. And once they

are inspired they will work 24 hours, they will do anything and they will understand and they will find it much, much easier, and they will not get tired, and they will be always optimistic about the future and so on.



So the message of inspiration I think is fundamental; it’s absolutely fundamental. You need to inspire students and kids, you know? So this is one of the reasons I decided to create the Starmus Festival: to inspire students and kids and in general everyone. Because I think that no matter how old you are — you can be 50 years old or 80 years old — and the moment you are inspired in any sort of science — if it’s astronomy or chemistry or whatever — I believe you have enough force and intelligence to do whatever you want to do, you know, it’s just a matter of having enough fuel for inspiration; you have to be inspired enough to do those things …

Dave Eicher: It’s a very powerful message. And tell us, before we get into more

of the background — for those who don’t know tell us a little bit of an overview of what Starmus is because there’s really nothing else like it in the world.

Garik Israelian: Yeah. Well, Starmus is like a very high-profile science festival

which is focused around astronomy. So space and astronomy are in the core of the festival, OK? So you can have talks by Nobel Prized scientists and very high-profile scientists about chemistry and so on and so on, but in the center of the festival — in the center — the core of the festival — it should be the science of astronomy and space.

Everything should be around — it’s like the solar system: you have

the Sun, which is astronomy of space in this case, and then you have planets revolving around the Sun. So I have the space and astronomy in the center, and I have the rest of the sciences — it can be sociology — you can have very interesting speakers — but the impact and inspiration should go from astronomy and space because I believe that this is the only science — astronomy and space sciences are quite unique because they are the only sciences which allows you to have this global view on things happening on this planet.

You know, you have to know where do you live, you have to have

this feeling, you have to know and you have to feel what the astronomy is about. And then you will have — it will change your point of view on many things happening on this planet.

So this is quite important. And very often I say starting astronomy

is not as important as to have a knowledge: it’s more important — because it allows you to change your views on how to resolve things on this planet.



Dave Eicher: It really gives you the ultimate perspective, which we so often lack as human beings.

Garik Israelian: Absolutely. Now I think is the only science that allows you to have

this global and very — a view from very, very far, you know? Here you can have that feeling, and you will feel it.

So I think being an amateur astronomer is so important, and I wish

everyone in society they would have to read astronomy articles, they have to have a background knowledge about astronomy and space because this is — for a general education — this is just to have them — to change them — you can change them with astronomy.

I believe that — it’s hard to change someone as a person with

biology or with any other science but you can change them with astronomy. It is the most powerful science. I mean I’m talking about it as an astronomer because you know I’m a professional: I want to sell my science so easily, right?

But I’m convinced — I am talking to many people — artists and

lawyers and politicians — when you talk to them, they all accept that astronomy has the most powerful message; no other science has the impact and power and inspiration as astronomy has, and I think we have to use that.

And we have to create events — like Starmus is an attempt — you

know Starmus is an experiment so I’m experimenting basically — trying to create a festival — exactly, Starmus is an experiment, and I’m trying to create a festival to get the maximum inspiration. You know, I want to inspire people in the most amazing way so when they leave the festival — so half of them will decide, “Now I’m going to read astronomy articles every day so I’m going to buy Astronomy magazine, I’m going to read everything — what’s going on in space,” and so that is the message. This is what I want.

I want people — I don’t think everyone has to become professional

astronomer — no, of course not — but people have to have this knowledge. They have to read every day or every two days, they have to know what’s going on.

When they hear news — when you turn on the TV, and you hear

astronomy news, you don’t have to change the channel; you have to keep it to at least the — so this is the goal; this is why I want to have Starmus to be a very high-profile event like a Davos. It is a world event when you get all the governments, all the bankers, and



the power of the Earth; they all meet in Davos to decide the future of the planet.

So I want to have a similar level, similar kind of event, but only for

scientists, and also artists — why not? So people who are inspired by astronomy and space and they get together, they share their message, and with nice exhibitions and with concert — why not — because music is so inspiring; many musicians that I meet they tell that they are so inspired by astronomy and space.

I was talking to many music stars — with Brian May, with Rick

Wakeman, Peter Gabrielle — all these people are extremely inspired by astronomy; they like very much astronomy. So we have to use them to send a message of astronomy everywhere and to use them to get … to inspire people and kids. So this is the goal of all the festival.

Dave Eicher: Which is spectacular. And that’s interesting that you brought that

up because Brian has remarked on that too, that there’s so many musicians who are interested in astronomy, and he’s actually shown people on tour some astronomical sites in the past here and there.

You’ve gotten to know many rock stars and other musicians as

well, I think. Garik Israelian: Of course. And I can tell you an interesting story that happened to

me. When I went to give a TED talk, and I’d seen — someone approached me after my talk and asked me — I think I mentioned in my article — my interview — about Meg Ryan —

Dave Eicher: Yeah. Garik Israelian: And so she approached me and asked me something about

spectroscopy and how we measure high-precision stars and so on — and I didn’t realize who is she because her face was familiar but I didn’t know her because you know I’m pretty far from films and movies — I didn’t know her.

Dave Eicher: You didn’t anticipate talking about spectroscopy with such a — Garik Israelian: Exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But when I asked her — and I said,

“Why don’t you attend astronomy conferences?” and she said because there are no interesting astronomy meetings.



You know and then I realized probably she’s right because obviously when you have astrophysicists and so on the profile of those events is not really very high.

Dave Eicher: No. Garik Israelian: From time to time you can get one very good speaker or two,

right? But this is not what will attract Hollywood stars; this is not how we will attract high-profile politicians and so on.

To attract those guys, you need a very high-profile event; you need

to get Nobel Prizes. That’s very clear, right? Dave Eicher: Astronauts. Garik Israelian: This is when I decided — this is why I decided — I said, “I will

need a very high-profile event.” Only then I can get these guys interested to come over. And only then I can get very interesting musicians and whoever to join the event to give this message to support astronomy, to make publicity, you know — and so this was my goal. So I decided I need a very high-profile event.

Dave Eicher: And the genesis of the idea of Starmus really emerged around that

notion. Garik Israelian: Exactly. Yeah, absolutely. I think TED was very important because

I was quite inspired by TED. When I saw the environment, when I saw the atmosphere, people, and so on, I said, “This is great; this is nice. We need something like that — and maybe even better in astronomy — focused in astronomy,” you know? Where the center — or the core — is about space and astronomy. And we will design everything around it will space, arts, physics, whatever, right, so we can think about that.

But the core has to be — the main message, inspiration — should

come from space and astronomy. So that was my idea. And then when we decided to work and push this ahead, I didn’t

know that I would be able to put two festivals to work in three years.

Dave Eicher: “What did I get myself into here?” you were thinking. Garik Israelian: Exactly. And I have to thank you Dave because you know you

realized how important this Starmus — and I’m really glad that Astronomy is collaborating with Starmus Festival and you are



helping me also to get this message, and it’s so important I think to have a collaboration with Astronomy magazine because you can reach amateur community, you can bring this message to — so this is — I mean we really need this collaboration in the future.

Dave Eicher: Absolutely. And thank you very much for saying that, Garik. And

I’m very — both personally and institutionally — very proud to be a part of it and to be associated and I think there are great, great, great things to come in the future.

And boy, I mean I will tell you, having been there in September to

my first Starmus — the second Starmus Festival — there really was nothing else ever like this that I’ve ever been to in 35 years of being involved in this hobby and this interest in this science, if you will. It’s really an incredible, really life-changing occurrence to go to this meeting. So I think it will only get more and more and more important in the future, and that’s really, really exciting.

Now your sort of genesis — sort of the architecture of how

Starmus would have moved forward was also — that story was kind of linked into your getting to know and being involved with professionally this guitarist fellow Brain May too, right?

Garik Israelian: Absolutely. Brian — I think — I myself — you know the thing is

— it’s so funny because I myself was very inspired, so unless I’m inspired I cannot do anything like Starmus. To do Starmus I had to be inspired. And I was inspired by Brian, by Alexei Leonov, by Jim Lovell — so then I decided that Starmus is going to be kind of a tribute to these guys.

You know, for me it is also a tribute — I’m so happy, I’m so

excited that I can get these guys — I can get Jim Lovell, I can get Leonov, I can get Brian — I had a poster of Brian made on the wall when I was a student. I never thought about it, “One day I’m going to meet Brian, I’m going to work with him, I’m going to be very good friends with him. He’s going to help me to push Starmus. And he’s going to inspire me even more.” And that’s what is happening.

Again then when I met Leonov — when I met Leonov in Moscow

I couldn’t believe that this is a guy — the first space walk. I saw him on the TV when I was a 10-year-old kid — 15 years old — yeah, I remember it was Leonov on the TV as a hero. He has an amazing — he speaks very, very, very well, you know, Alexei Leonov speaking is so convincing. And he’s an artist, you know, he’s an amazing painter. Leonov is a very famous painter.



And when I saw his paintings, when I hear him talking about space

and so on, he gave me so much energy. I was so inspired because that was in 2009 or ’10 when I met him first and that was another message to inspire me for Starmus — after meeting Leonov and meeting Brian and then talking to Arthur C. Clarke and then meeting — and then I had more than enough energy to put something like Starmus on the table.

Dave Eicher: That’s really incredible. It’s incredible the associations and to be

working with those folks now that are here as well — I think I remember seeing a photo of you playing guitar years and years and years ago, playing the Queen song “39” many years ago.

Garik Israelian: Absolutely. Dave Eicher: And you mentioned watching Leonov’s space walk — it’s just

incredible how years later this all came together. And for those who don’t know, let me just mention — I mean here are the speakers from this first book that’s just out now about the first Starmus Festival that was held in the Canaries in 2011 — I mean here are the contributing authors: Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, Alexei Leonov, Bill Anders, Jim Lovell, Victor Gorbatko, Charlie Duke, Jack Szostak, Richard Dawkins, Jill Tarter, George Smoot, Michel Mayor — it goes on and on and on — Joe Silk and Garik Israelian and then Brian May and Adam Burrows — it goes on — I mean this is an incredible who’s who. There’s no book like this as well as no conference like this. It’s really a book that everyone should have who is an astronomy enthusiast as well because it’s priceless — the information in it.

Garik Israelian: Absolutely Dave. I mean you can’t imagine my feelings when back

in 2009 and ’10 when I was coming up with the idea of organizing my first festival and I didn’t know the subject, and then I realized that it’s going to be 50 years of the first space travel by Yuri Gagarin of the first space flight, OK?

And then I was searching the Internet desperately trying to find

who is organizing what about this day. And I couldn’t believe that there was nothing going on at a big level: I mean on the Internet there was nothing.

Dave Eicher: Unbelievable. Garik Israelian: Yes, how could this be? Unbelievable. I mean this is 50 years of

the first space flight and no one is doing nothing. How is it



possible? And then — I was inspired and I said, “I’ll have to do something. I can’t say — I have to do something.”

And when I took this decision and I talked to Leonov and I talked

to Brian and they said, “Well, if you can do it we’ll help you. Just go ahead.”

It was really hard work contacting Buzz and so on and so —

building the whole festival. But then I remember the best moment really did — the supernova of that event was when one month before the festival — one month before the festival started I received an email from Neil Armstrong to say that he’s coming.

And I remember it was late at night — it was 2:00 a.m. — and I

started crying. I cannot believe — rather that it was so really going to — I couldn’t believe that the email was coming from Neil Armstrong, and he was saying that he’s interested and he wants to join the festival and he will join the roundtable discussion and he will come as a — I said, “This is impossible. I can’t believe.” And it was so incredible.

And this was a very difficult moment because I had no sponsors on

board. I had no sponsors because I was investing the money that I got from the prize — the prize I received for science — and with a friend: so we were investing our own money with very, very few sponsors — very few sponsors. And we had quite important financial difficulties to carry on with the festival.

But when I received this email from Neil — from Armstrong — I

said, “OK, no way. So I don’t care how or when, but we will do it because we cannot fail. If Neil Armstrong is coming, it means that this is done.” So no matter how — it was a very powerful message of inspiration, you know?

And strange enough, I went to discuss this with potential sponsors

and no one — no one was believing that Neil Armstrong is coming. And now I see on the website that people are telling me that we are crazy. “Neil Armstrong never attended any conference, he never gives speeches, and so how is it possible — no one ever heard of Starmus, no one ever heard of me, no one ever heard of … how is it possible that Neil Armstrong will come to the festival?”

Dave Eicher: You did the impossible.



Garik Israelian: Yeah, exactly. And when he came and we came, it was a real shock. It was a real shock for local government, and it was a real shock for many potential sponsors who were so negative about the festival, who were saying that this is all fake, no one is coming and so on — and we were so desperately convincing them that, “No, guys, this is true. We will do it. They are coming,” and so on and so on.

And I’m so happy that they came, and Neil was here — and finally

before Armstrong left the festival in Tenerife, he wrote a very nice — you know, he also said to me that he found the festival very nice, very interesting, it was one of the most inspiring meetings that he ever attended. He enjoyed very much the festival, and it was really — and Leonov told the same actually. Leonov said in the media that this was the best, best science meeting he has ever seen.

Dave Eicher: Wow. Garik Israelian: So I was so proud that we could — we were able to create this

atmosphere. And I mean — but this was true because the atmosphere was so honest, you know, this is the point — it was so honest. There was not any flavor of politics or money or whatever, you know? It was purely coming from people who were inspired by these guys, and we were paying a tribute to them, you know? And they could see that.

They could see that. When they met me, they found someone who

was inspired by them, and it was paying a tribute to them basically, you know, and they liked that. And both Neil and Leonov and they liked very much the overall atmosphere, it was so positive and so inspiring and so nice.

And then after this first festival, I said, “Okay, we were

inaugurated it by Neil Armstrong.” And wished us to do the second festival and he said we have to carry on, so which means we have to carry on. We have no choice, you know, because no one else but Neil Armstrong was the one to say, to inaugurate the festival, you know?

Dave Eicher: Now it’s such a huge undertaking Garik. Did you have a month

after the first festival where you just said, “I’m going to go lie down and not think about this before I think about how to take this on again?”



Garik Israelian: Absolutely. I was extremely tired afterwards. There were huge financial problems and so — and we had to sort out many things after the first Starmus. But since it was so inspiring and so positive, everything was very, very small compared with that, you know?

This is one of those situations when you realize that the message

and the atmosphere and the environment are much more important than anything else. The rest — everything can be sorted in a matter of time.

It was both one year or two years or five years, but you made

history. You have made something which is historical and cannot be repeated, and that’s very important.

And once you realize that, everything else is small, you know?

And I think it’s quite important, Dave — and this is why you guys — you get onboard — this is why — and I’m really happy that you were also inspired by — when you saw that the whole thing was going on, when you saw this you yourself were inspired and you said, “I’m with you,” basically.

Dave Eicher: Absolutely. And frankly I had heard about the first one late enough

that I couldn’t really go all of the sudden, and it really was sort of a downer, but it was such an honor to be involved with the second festival that happened this past year.

And for the people who go to it — I think we had something like

800 people altogether there this year. Garik Israelian: Yeah, it bit more. We were close to 1,000. Dave Eicher: Is that right? Wow. Garik Israelian: Yeah, yeah, it was close to 1,000, yeah. Dave Eicher: And this is not an event — this is not like you’re going and you’re

seeing an astronaut or a Nobel Prize winner giving a talk and they’re off in another place on a huge stage and you can’t get near — this is a place where people can mingle and say hello to the — and have conversations — I mean I ended up having dinner with Richard Dawkins twice — my wife and I.

You know, this is a place where you can really interact with these

folks and really discuss things and — what inspires us all about the universe, the fact that it’s all available to everyone — the same laboratory here — and that so much of astronomy and science and



the other inspirational aspects of Starmus they give us really a glint of telling us why we’re here on this planet.

Garik Israelian: Absolutely. And this is — you know, I enjoyed so much seeing

people asking for autographs and signatures from Nobel Prizes and astronauts because it’s so nice when scientists give autographs.

You know, living in Spain I see everyday football players and

actors and all these guys giving out — I never see scientists giving out autographs.

Dave Eicher: Are there planets in the universe where the scientists are the heroes

culturally? Yeah, I don’t know. Garik Israelian: Yeah, maybe. So this is the nice thing of Starmus — I enjoyed the

most — the best moment for me is when I see people asking autographs to — Richard Dawkins or Harry Kroto or Bill Wilson — because they realize these are scientists, you know, and astronauts and these are very important because they are ask for photo — and I like it, so this is why we want to do Starmus because we want these people to be recognized, appreciated, you know, and — so I like that — you know, I really like seeing scientists respected, and you know it’s so important for me.

Dave Eicher: And so many interesting things that they had to say about not only

astronomy and astrophysics and cosmology but about paleontology as well — and chemistry and all sorts of a wide subjects that all tie together, and it was really an intellectually eye-opening meeting for people to attend.

Garik Israelian: Absolutely. And you know honestly it’s not only — you don’t

have to be a Nobel Prize to be recognized as a scientist because there are many astronomers — many scientists — who never received a Nobel Prize, but they are really good and are very well-known. And I think Starmus should be a door for these people to get recognized in the community.

You know, so this is one of the reasons I want to become a kind of

a door when these people get recognition also. Not among astronomy amateurs but also in the general public, you know, because Starmus shouldn’t be only for astronomy amateurs; it’s open for the general public so anyone has to come to Starmus. And once they get to Starmus, they will know all these guys and they will know that they are all very respected scientists and they should ask them for autographs. This is what I want, you know?



So I want these guys to come to someone like Michel Mayor and they will know who is this guy and this is the guy who discovered the first extrasolar planet. “Okay, let’s go to — he’s sitting in a chair; let’s go get the book.”

It’s nice. I want this to happen, you know? And this is what I want.

And, “Who is this guy?” “Oh, this is the guy who discovered the pulsars are whatever, right, or supernova.” “Okay, let’s go and ask for a signature, right?” I like that, you know?

Dave Eicher: Well that’s great, and you’re helping to make that happen. And of

course the location — the first two Starmus conferences of course have been in the Canary Islands, Tenerife and La Palma — and that’s a pretty spectacular place for astronomy as well — and of course La Palma with the largest single-aperture telescope in the world — the Gran Telescopio Canarias — and lots of other domes as well. And it’s very sort of analogous you know from an American point of view to thinking about Hawaii: you have this beautiful set of volcanic islands and one of the great premier black skies on the planet as well of course.

Garik Israelian: Absolutely. I think — I’m really proud of my idea to have a

roundtable discussion inside of a telescope dome. Dave Eicher: Yes. Garik Israelian: It’s quite interesting to have — and the duration is 108 minutes —

the duration of the first flight of Gagarin. Dave Eicher: Now how — if I may interject quickly Garik — how were you

inspired to make that connection and to use that symbolism for the roundtable?

Garik Israelian: I don’t know, it was just an idea that came to my mind because

when I was thinking, “I will need a roundtable discussion,” and then I was thinking, “Where? Where?” And I said, “Well, the best place is a telescope dome.” OK, we’ll do it. And then the second thing obviously was what should be the duration of the roundtable? One hours? Two hours? No, I need a symbol. I need something more symbolic. And then I said, “OK, 108 minutes of duration.”

So these were really simple ideas and they just came to my mind

from nowhere basically. But every time I was quite thrilled with the idea and I would think, “This is so nice. We have to put it like a trademark,” you know?



Dave Eicher: Yeah. Well, it worked. Garik Israelian: Absolutely. And I don’t know what will happen with Starmus in

the future. It may even be traveling the world, you know? So Starmus can even go from the Canary Islands to Hawaii or to Hong Kong or to somewhere else in Spain.

I think it’s not so bad to move a bit — Starmus — around the glove, you know, and make it more international, you know, so it can go to Japan or it can go to Hawaii. So it’s nice.

But I will always keep the same format. Always have the same

format with the roundtable discussion, concert, exhibition and a conference which is called Discover the Cosmos and Change the World. Because I think it’s also a very powerful message. You change the world by studying astronomy, and not only because you get the knowledge but also because you change yourself; you change your point of view, you think globally, you think in a different way, and this is why you change the world.

Dave Eicher: Yes indeed. It was Carl Sagan who used to say 99.9 percent of

people live out their lives and die on this planet without realizing their place in the cosmos. And what you’re doing is giving them that opportunity for that realization.

Garik Israelian: Absolutely. And I’m one of those who believe that the world will

change when people realize where do they live — when they get knowledge in astronomy. So when I see all these troubles on the planet, you know, they mostly want to fight over religions and so on — it’s so incredible that you have people living in — actually before Christ — you now, a few thousand years of — with the mentality — with societies which are so, so, so — yeah, it is incredible.

Then you live also in the 21st century, then it’s — the diversity is

so incredible — it’s so incredible: you cannot believe that on the same planet you can have people…

And I think — I wish we would have a chance one day to educate

people in countries like Afghanistan or in Pakistan because I believe the children in those villages they are born with open mind — any child anywhere is born with an open mind; it’s just the way, how you shape it.



And it’s a shame that they don’t have a chance to learn astronomy, they don’t have a chance to learn about science and to have an open mind.

So I don’t know. I wish we would have a network of festivals in all

the globe. And children should have a chance to study — you know, countries studying — I don’t know, I personally — I don’t see anything good coming from a very, very religious community, you know, because they don’t allow kids to open the beauty of their mind, to investigate, to wonder, to question. To question, that’s the most important thing of the human being — the gift that we have is to question things, you know, otherwise what’s the …

And so maybe one day Starmus will be big enough to concur with

the Middle East or whatever. Dave Eicher: Yeah, yeah, well we need to keep fighting the good fight. And

there’s so much positivity and so much to share as human beings. I mean it’s really — and I’m not going to use a word that would make Richard Dawkins — I’m not going to say it’s miraculous, but it’s pretty amazing that we have these sentient realization here on a planet, that we’re living beings made of atoms and molecules, quirks — and that we can think about the universe in this way and yet there’s these — as you say — these are unfortunately such dark, discouraging times in the world in many ways because of politics and because of nationalism and because of religion and fanaticism and — it is discouraging.

I mean we need to make more noise for Garik and for the festival

and the world needs more Garik Israelians. Garik Israelian: Thanks, Dave. Yeah, you know I believe we together — we have a

lot of work to do, you know: we have a lot of work to go. Dave Eicher: Yeah. Garik Israelian: We have so many responsibilities to do because we’re all happy in

a way that — we’ve got an interesting job, we have an interesting hobby and we are doing — I mean we are enjoying our work, right, and we see it as someone …

Yeah, but we have to be probably more ambitious to ask for more

— to do more — which is good. I see it in people like Brian May — Brian is actually like that, you know? Brian is a nonstop — he’s putting in his head everywhere: affecting animals and humanoids, music, astronomy, 3-D and — which is nice because — and he



wants to succeed everywhere, and he’s very ambitious in his cause and very — and he’s one of those who thinks that astronomy is something which can change the world, you know.

Dave Eicher: Absolutely. Well, talk briefly for a little bit if we can about your

own research, because you’ve done a lot of spectroscopy and a lot of investigations of a wide variety of really interesting objects.

Of course the number one category that we have in terms of rapid

change is the discovery of exoplanets. Of course you need to update the numbers weekly with regard to what we know about exoplanets.

Garik Israelian: Yeah. Dave Eicher: And you’ve done a lot of interesting stuff with black holes, you’ve

done work on supernovae and other high-energy astrophysics. And tell us a bit, if you would, about the Ambartsumian Prize.

Garik Israelian: Well, we were so honored to get the Ambartsumian Prize —

actually it was the first edition of the prize that I had the honor to share with Michel Mayor and — another scientist — for the work we did on characterizing stars with extrasolar planets.

Because we were the ones to begin the project back in ’99–2000.

And — well actually, honestly it is a very, very interesting project. And for me it’s even more interesting than discovering planets because I know what’s going on in the field and there are so many folks working in exoplanets and discovering planets and capitalizing on all of these jobs and so on. It’s a huge — the field is expanding — it’s big.

But the one thing I wanted to know and I set to investigate is the

connection — is basically heat and connection — this mysterious connection between stars and planets.

Well, why — I was always asking myself a very simple naïve

question: “Is it possible that stars somehow affect formation of planets in a way that certain types of planetary systems are formed in stars which have these or those characteristics?” Very little change in stellar rotation, magnetic field, or so on can have a huge effect on formation of planetary systems.

This question was always in my mind. And I was trying to find a

link to link basically characteristics of stars with planets. Not only chemical composition because we know that it has an effect —



obviously the chemical makeup of a star will affect a makeup of planets. If a star is metal-rich, you will have a metal-rich planet and formation in physical conditions that will be different. If you have more oxygen on a star, it will be reflected on the formation of planets and dynamics of planets and so on; this is very clear.

But not only that but also a rotation — which kind of rotation —

pulsations, magnetic fields — so there are many things, and we have absolutely no clues about those things.

And I think we are just beginning to hit those questions with

Kepler data. Because Kepler is the only — basically it’s the only experiment which allows to measure rotation and velocities and period of rotation of thousands of stars with the planets. It’s very hard precision.

And I know my colleagues have been working on this, and we are

just getting into the field now, and I really think maybe — I don’t know, maybe in five years or 10 years we will have the — we will know a bit more about relation of stars and planets — but this is the big question because obviously — I know my colleagues, … Willy Benz in Switzerland, they are doing various simulations of planet formation.

Forming planets is not difficult with numerical simulations — you

form them, OK? But we also know that very little change in physical parameters will have a huge impact of all the kinds of the planets in the system that you are forming, OK?

Now how, from observations, we can put physical constraints on

those things, then we will perfectly know if this kind of planet in a system is formed because the star has this and that, you know?

Dave Eicher: Yes. You’re comparing them. Garik Israelian: So that’s a very interesting question, and this is what I want to

understand. Basically there’s a lot of physics in this; a lot, a lot. And we have no idea about these things.

Dave Eicher: And very ambitious because with the data that you do have you’re

comparing attributes of individual stars but also comparing stellar systems to each other, so that’s a gigantic puzzle to try to put relationships together in, isn’t it?

Garik Israelian: Absolutely. And the thing is we need precisions here. It is a game

of precisions. We need very high-precision measurements of stellar



rotations, velocities, spots, inactivity, and all that stuff — very high precision — so which means this is a long-term project. And you have to set this project and go on for 10 years or 15 years investigating spots, rotation — and with very high precision, with less than 5 percent we have to know abundances of chemical elements about — is it carbon or something — and we are really far from that.

Today we have no way to measure a composition of nitrogen or

oxygen or something with precision more than 10 or 15 percent, which is not enough at all.

For those things — if we want to really understand the impact of

stellar composition on planet formation and dynamics, we need much higher precision. We need precision better than 5 percent of — 2, 3 percent — and we still cannot do that.

Dave Eicher: Yeah. Garik Israelian: We can’t do it because of the — we need best precision spectrum,

we need better models of atmospheres, we need to calibrate data, and so on and so on.

You know, working in the field for more than 15 years I know

really — I see what’s going on, you know. I’ve been supervising several Ph.D.s in this topic. And actually now I have a student working on the chemical composition of stars that have solar planets and we are working on nitrogen abundances from a VLT spectrum — from an HP2 telescope — yeah, and very hard. Really hard work.

We have been struggling with those spectra for about eight months

because the UV spectra are so complicated — it’s a jungle of spectra lights and dealing with these spectra is a pain. So people don’t realize — because you know for people it’s just a nitrogen abundance, so what?

No, no, no, it’s so hard — those things are so serious — you have

to take them seriously, you know, and once you take them seriously, you realize that — but it’s quite interesting and it’s also very important.

So I really enjoy the project starting with chemical composition of

stars with extrasolar planets. And also black hole binaries is basically a similar project we’re doing with black hole binaries: we are investigating stars in binary systems with neutron stars in black



holes. Because we know that supernova explosions will affect secondary stars in those systems.

Again, how they will affect rotation, chemical composition —

what will happen with the secondary star? That’s something we want to understand. And again, it’s a very serious project because those stars are faint, you need large telescopes, you need a very good quality data and the status models of atmospheres are not OK for those stars because they’re just throwing x-ray radiation from a black hole accretion disk — changing the stellar atmosphere, creating local chromospheres and so on and so on, and so the whole physics is getting more and more complicated.

But it’s nice. But it’s nice. Dave Eicher: Both of these areas — these are high-precision, very complex

projects in order to decipher what’s going on. Is there something that attracts you to that kind of a difficulty of degree? I mean this is really complex stuff to conclude things from.

Garik Israelian: Yeah, well I believe — I mean I was always attracted by

spectroscopy — always — because for me it was really physics, you know? So once I see physics behind, once I see something that’s like a jungle — it’s like a … you’re working on like a very fine, fine — and I like that, you know, I like that.

And it’s partially also because I did my Ph.D. — my Ph.D. was

completely theoretical. It was all about radiation transfer, formational spectral light and so on.

When I finished my Ph.D. I was so tired from theoretical work,

and I said, “That’s enough. I have to do some observations.” Dave Eicher: Become an observer, yes. Garik Israelian: As an observer, yes. So I moved to doing more observational work,

and I’ve been also working quite a lot on massive stars: supergiant, hypergiant, you know, blue hypergiants.

Dave Eicher: Yeah. Interesting. Garik Israelian: I’ve done a lot of work on P Cygni — you know, the famous P

Cygni star. I think probably at least six or seven papers I published only on P Cygni hypergiant, models of stellar winds and — we actually published a Space Science Reviews paper only dedicated to P Cygni.



Yeah, yeah, yeah, it was quite interesting work on the massive

stars. Luminas blue variables, you know, the focal — Dave Eicher: Sure, LBVs yeah. Garik Israelian: And I was doing more of the stellar winds of LBVs — that was

partially also in my Ph.D. Eta Carinae — I’ve done a lot of work. And then at some point I decided, “OK, I have to move on and do something else,” and — because I think I realized that for those stars you need a long-term monitoring project, and nowadays it’s hard to get observing time for massive stars.

And so I decided, OK, I’ve put those projects for long-time

monitoring on spectrograph and then after 5 or 10 years I will gather other spectrograph and we’ll see what’s going on.

And actually this is what I’m doing now. I’ve got a huge collection

of spectra on Rigel, Beta Orionis, and amazing data — Dave Eicher: Huh. Yeah, and that would be — Garik Israelian: Yeah, I got it in Canary Islands with the robotic telescope

STELLA in Teide Observatory. With STELLA, I’ve got hundreds of spectral of Beta Orion and — yeah, yeah, it’s quite an amazing dataset that I have showing kind of flares from a massive star. So indicating kind of spots on massive stars, magnetic activity, and massive supergiant and — very nice data.

At some point I will need a Ph.D. student to work on it to help me

get through the … Yeah, yeah, we are collecting data from Rho Cassiopeiae, another cool hypergiant — and that is a very nice star; it’s very complicated because she had a combination of pulsations with activity — which kind of activity we have no idea. You know, because from those stars you also have ejections — pulse and all that stuff — and this is also combined with very complicated pulsations of stars, so then altogether they create a very, very complex picture on the spectrum.

Dave Eicher: So then you’ve got multi-variables to unravel to understand what’s

causing what — what’s going on there in the spectra. Garik Israelian: Exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it’s nice — this is also stellar

astronomy, and you know I consider myself as a stellar person — a stellar astronomer. Yeah, and I’m OK with stars.



Dave Eicher: More than in one sense there. Garik Israelian: Right, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Dave Eicher: You’re really a forensic pathologist for unusual stars. Really. Garik Israelian: Yeah, yeah, yeah, you know, the supergiants, binaries, and planet-

host stars and whatever stars that I — yeah, I like stars. Dave Eicher: I think that is a good thing. That is a good thing. Well, Garik we’ve

got a few minutes left here — if you do as well — tell us where is — so can you make a declaration that there will be another Starmus?

Garik Israelian: Yes, I think I can say that we will do another Starmus, definitely.

We will do Starmus 3 — Dave Eicher: Somewhere, sometime Starmus 3 in — Garik Israelian: We are considering where we will do the next Starmus but I think

it will be very soon, probably even this year. Dave Eicher: Wow. So really? Garik Israelian: So maybe even this year. Dave Eicher: So stay tuned all of you listeners and readers for more information

to come relatively soon perhaps even. Garik Israelian: Very soon. And it will be again dedicated to something big. So we

have to — we will need a message — I think it’s quite important to have a message in each Starmus festival.

Dave Eicher: Yes, a theme. Garik Israelian: So we will have a — but we will definitely do another festival

because the second one was so very successful, and now we have someone like Stephen Hawking on board — who is a member of Starmus board — and Stephen Hawking said that he has never seen a festival like Starmus and he likes very much the combination of rock music with astronomy.

Dave Eicher: And that’s even an amazing thing to have Stephen Hawking

declare this, isn’t it?



Garik Israelian: Yeah, yeah, yeah, because he enjoyed his own introduction, because you may remember Dave when we introduced him it was very powerful rock music as Stephen Hawking was coming to the stage.

Dave Eicher: Yes. Garik Israelian: He liked it very much. Dave Eicher: That was as big of intro as Queen ever had in the day I think. It

was incredible. And you put that together Garik, didn’t you? Garik Israelian: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I put the whole thing together. And I also

enjoyed when Stephen Hawking with Nobel Prize speakers — and I put astronauts in the first row — when Rick Wakeman playing with Brian May — it was a rock concert and the first line were with Stephen Hawking, you know, very serious scientists, you know, Nobel Prizes and so on — and watching a rock concert.

That was nice. It was really — I mean I liked that. Dave Eicher: It was an incredible thing to see, and it was a hell of a show of

course to see Rick and Brian brought out to join Rick’s band and of course them to do “39” as well — he did the sci-fi Queen song of course with relativity as a theme and time dilation.

Garik Israelian: Yeah, yeah, yeah, after the — it was a very big show, and also the

Starmus star party with the band Nosound was really nice. And actually Nosound is a very nice band — it’s a very nice band. They are producing now a DVD of the concert. The Teide Starmus Party Concert.

Dave Eicher: Great. Garik Israelian: And it’s a very nice DVD — I saw a couple of tracks — and this

band they resemble kind of Pink Floyd. They have a Pink Floyd type of sound: they’re very nice.

And the guy who makes the band — the leader is an amateur

astronomer actually. That’s another thing — Giancarlo Erra. Yeah, at some point I have to put you in touch with him: he’s a very talented guy — a very good musician. Very much Pink Floyd sound, very much — and very modest. Very modest and very — so we have to collaborate with these guys again in the near future.



But of course we will do another festival because, you know, as Queen says, “The show must go on.”

Dave Eicher: Yeah, yeah, excellent. Well Garik we’ve actually run out of time.

Thank you so much for joining me today. It was a really, really special thing to talk to you, and I know the readers and the listeners will love hearing about you and your background and Starmus and your past and the future in everything.

Garik Israelian: Thank you very much David and thank you for everything you did

for Starmus, and I’m sure we will do even more — much more with you and with Astronomy. Thanks a lot.

garik israeliansuperstars of astronomy, astrophysicist at the … · 2015. 2. 16. · garik...

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