Chelen Johnson
SIRXS (SEIP IR Excess Survey) : looking for IR excesses around stars found within the Spitzer Enhanced Imaging Products (SEIP) source list.
Honestly, I left [the 2013 AAS] a bit more in love with astronomy. I just plain had fun wandering and treated myself to time as a learner. It is not often we, educators, get to slide out of expert mode and into learner mode.
In summary, this [AAS meeting] was amazing. For four straight days, if I'd thrown a rock I would have hit a scientist. Priceless.
One of the things I love about astronomy is the very fact that we are not laboratory-bound scientists. Our lab is the universe, a constantly changing petri dish in the sky, so to say, and if you aren’t looking, you miss it!