Friday, September 04, 2026

The MCSS Messenger

New and exciting activities in the
McDonnell Center for the Space Sciences

Recent News From McDonnell Center Fellows

WashU researchers witness launch of NASA’s Roman Space Telescope

Tansu Daylan and members of his AstroMusers research group, Zifan Lin, Asaf Kaya, Jacqueline Vazquez, Nathan Whitsett, Bryce Wedig and Aysu Ece Saricaoglu traveled to Florida to watch NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope launch on August 30. The launch marks a new phase of work for the group, which is involved in preparing for Roman’s unprecedented observations.

MCSS Fellows in the News

Recent Publications by McDonnell Center Fellows

VanBommel, S. J., Christian, J. R., Knight, A. L., et al. (2026). A native sulfur deposit in Gale crater, Mars. Science, 393(6813), 820–825.

Romeo, I., Hahn, R. M., Byrne, P. K., et al. (2026). A heterogeneous lithosphere on Venus. Earth and Planetary Science Letters, 693, 120275.

Alford, M. G., Brodie, L., Foucart, F., & Haber, A. (2026). Thermalization of neutrinos in a neutron star merger simulation. Physical Review. D/Physical Review. D., 114(4).

Dev, P. S. B., et al. (2026). Minimal dark SU(2) origin of a massless Dirac neutrino. Physical Review D, 114(3), L031702.

Piarulli, M., King, G. B., Pastore, S., et al. (2026). Quantum Monte Carlo calculation of δ_C in the superallowed β decay of ¹⁰C. Physical Review C, 114(2).

Larner, S. R., Nowak, M. A., & Wilms, J. (2026). Generation of correlated time series for X-ray astronomy applications. RAS Techniques and Instruments, 5.

Can rock glaciers replace glacier water resources?

EEPS Colloquium
Suzanne Anderson
University of Colorado Boulder
Friday, September 4
12:00pm, Rudolph 301

From Diamond Defects to Protein-based Qubit Sensors

Physics Colloquium
Peter Maurer
University of Chicago
Wednesday, September 9
3:00pm, Compton 340

From Mineral Interfaces to Resource Ecosystems

EEPS Colloquium
Yuanzhi Tang
Georgia Institute of Technology
Thursday, September 10
11:30am, Rudolph 301

Producing the GeV Galactic Center Excess via Cosmic Ray-Dark Matter Scattering

Physics Theory Seminar
Debopam Goswami
Texas A&M University
Thursday, September 10
3:00pm, Compton 241

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Interim Director: William McKinnon
Associate Director: Michael Nowak
Assistant to the Director: Vickie Gee
Communications Specialist: Alison Verbeck

Compiled and edited by Alison Verbeck. Have news to share? Please send it along!

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