Mark Brake | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | 31 October 1958 |
| Nationality | British |
| Known for | Popularising the relationship between space, science and culture |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Physics, Science Communication |
Mark Brake (born 31 October 1958) is a Welsh author, broadcaster and former professor of science communication at the University of Glamorgan. [1]
Brake was born at Mountain Ash, Wales, UK. He was awarded a BSc by the University of Glamorgan and a MSc by University College Cardiff in 1988. [2]
In 1999, Brake established what he described as 'the world's first science fiction degree', [3] and in 2000, as Head of Earth and Space Sciences at The University of Glamorgan, was involved with an initiative to introduce school children to the study of astrophysics. [4] The following year, Russian cosmonauts Commander Aleksandr Aleksandrovich Volkov and Alexandre Martynov toured Britain in a series of lectures organised by Brake's department. [5] In 2005, Brake helped establish, and became head of, a degree in Astrobiology, described by a fellow academic as the UK's first full degree in the subject. [6] Between 2003 and 2008, Brake was responsible for leading public engagement initiatives in science, which attracted around £5 million of funding. [7] The RoCCoTO project, launched in 2001, was a community-based science course for the public, featuring ideas about science and their cultural context in an instance of "Third Culture" studies. [8] The RoCCoTO project received a Public Engagement Award from the Astrobiology Society of Britain in 2008. [9] Alien Worlds, an award-winning multimedia website associated with the RoCCoTO project was launched in July 2009. The website is an animated guide to phenomena such as eclipses of the Sun and Moon, and demonstrates Earth's place in a cosmic perspective through advanced, animated visuals. More recently, Brake has co-written and co-hosted a series of live tours with educational rapper Jon Chase, [10] appearing at the 2012 Hay Festival with a show entitled The Science of Doctor Who, [11] and the 2014 festival with The Science of Star Wars. [12] Since 2016, Brake has been writing a series of 'Science of' books for Skyhorse Publishing. [13]
In 2006, Brake submitted a grant application to the Research Councils' Procurement Organisation in which he falsely claimed to have a PhD from Cardiff University. The University of Glamorgan described this as "an isolated incident." [14] Brake continued to work at the University of Glamorgan as a professor of science communication until 2010. [15]
Brake has argued that Charles Darwin's theory of evolution, as expressed in his 1859 Origin of Species, was influenced by the work of Alfred Russel Wallace. [16] This view has been contested. [17]
Astrobiology, formerly known as exobiology, is an interdisciplinary scientific field that studies the origins, early evolution, distribution, and future of life in the universe. Astrobiology considers the question of whether extraterrestrial life exists, and if it does, how humans can detect it.
Extraterrestrial life is hypothetical life that may occur outside Earth and which did not originate on Earth. Such life might range from simple prokaryotes to intelligent beings and even sapient beings, possibly bringing forth civilizations that might be far more advanced than humanity. The Drake equation speculates about the existence of sapient life elsewhere in the universe. The science of extraterrestrial life in all its forms is known as astrobiology.
Panspermia is the hypothesis that life exists throughout the Universe, distributed by space dust, meteoroids, asteroids, comets, and planetoids, as well as by spacecraft carrying unintended contamination by microorganisms. Distribution may have occurred spanning galaxies, and so may not be restricted to the limited scale of solar systems.
The search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) is a collective term for scientific searches for intelligent extraterrestrial life, for example, monitoring electromagnetic radiation for signs of transmissions from civilizations on other planets.
Alexei Arkhipovich Leonov was a Soviet and Russian cosmonaut, Air Force major general, writer, and artist. On 18 March 1965, he became the first person to conduct a spacewalk, exiting the capsule during the Voskhod 2 mission for 12 minutes and 9 seconds. He was also selected to be the first Soviet person to land on the Moon although the project was cancelled.
The University of Glamorgan was a university based in South Wales prior to the merger with University of Wales, Newport, that formed the University of South Wales in April 2013. The university was based in Pontypridd, in Rhondda Cynon Taf, with campuses in Trefforest, Glyntaff, Merthyr Tydfil, Tyn y Wern and Cardiff. The university had four faculties, and was the only university in Wales which had no link with the University of Wales.
Xenoarchaeology, a branch of xenology dealing with extraterrestrial cultures, is a hypothetical form of archaeology that exists mainly in works of science fiction. The field is concerned with the study of material remains to reconstruct and interpret past life-ways of alien civilizations. Xenoarchaeology is not currently practiced by mainstream archaeologists due to the current lack of any material for the discipline to study.
Nalin Chandra Wickramasinghe is a Sri Lankan-born British mathematician, astronomer and astrobiologist of Sinhalese ethnicity. His research interests include the interstellar medium, infrared astronomy, light scattering theory, applications of solid-state physics to astronomy, the early Solar System, comets, astrochemistry, the origin of life and astrobiology. A student and collaborator of Fred Hoyle, the pair worked jointly for over 40 years as influential proponents of panspermia. In 1974 they proposed the hypothesis that some dust in interstellar space was largely organic, later proven to be correct.
Expedition: Being an Account in Words and Artwork of the 2358 A.D. Voyage to Darwin IV is a 1990 speculative evolution and science fiction book written and illustrated by the American artist and writer Wayne Barlowe. Written as a first-person account of a 24th-century manned expedition to the fictional planet of Darwin IV, Expedition describes and discusses an imaginary extraterrestrial ecosystem as if it were real.
The Kerala red rain phenomenon was a blood rain event that occurred in Wayanad district region of Malabar on Monday, 15 July 1957 and the colour subsequently turned yellow and also 25 July to 23 September 2001, when heavy downpours of red-coloured rain fell sporadically on the southern Indian state of Kerala, staining clothes pink. Yellow, green and black rain was also reported. Coloured rain was also reported in Kerala in 1896 and several times since, most recently in June 2012, and from 15 November 2012 to 27 December 2012 in eastern and north-central provinces of Sri Lanka.
The Lost Cosmonauts or Phantom Cosmonauts are subjects of a conspiracy theory alleging that some Soviet cosmonauts went to outer space, but their existence has never been publicly acknowledged by either the Soviet or Russian space authorities. Proponents of the Lost Cosmonauts theory argue that the Soviet Union attempted to launch human spaceflights before Yuri Gagarin's first spaceflight, and the cosmonauts onboard died in those attempts. Another cosmonaut, Vladimir Ilyushin, has been the subject of allegations to have landed off course and been held by the Chinese government. The Government of the Soviet Union supposedly suppressed this information, to prevent bad publicity during the height of the Cold War.
William M. Napier or Bill Napier is the author of five high tech thriller novels and a number of nonfiction science books.
Steven J. Dick is an American astronomer, author, and historian of science most noted for his work in the field of astrobiology. Dick served as the Chief Historian for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration from 2003 to 2009 and as the Baruch S. Blumberg NASA/Library of Congress Chair in Astrobiology from 2013 to 2014. Before that, he was an astronomer and historian of science at the United States Naval Observatory in Washington, DC, from 1979 to 2003.
The Bute Building is a Cardiff University building in Cathays Park, Cardiff, Wales. It houses the Welsh School of Architecture. It is a Grade II listed building.
Adrian Czajkowski is a British fantasy and science fiction author. He is best known for his series Shadows of the Apt, and for his novel Children of Time.
The University of South Wales is a public university in Wales, with campuses in Cardiff, Newport and Pontypridd. It was formed on 11 April 2013 from the merger of the University of Glamorgan and the University of Wales, Newport. The university is the second largest university in Wales in terms of its student numbers, and offers around 200 undergraduate and postgraduate courses. The university has three main faculties across its campuses in South Wales.
Milton Wainwright is a British microbiologist who is known for his research into what he claims could be extraterrestrial life found in the stratosphere.
Shawn D. Domagal-Goldman is a research space scientist at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, who specializes in exoplanets, Archean geochemistry, planetary atmospheres, and astrobiology.
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