Dr. Christopher Bird

March 28, 2017 - For anyone who has ever dreamed of discovering a new planet in our solar system, there is a great new volunteer science project that has come online tonight. The Planet9 Project is asking users around the world to look at photos of the night sky, and look for coloured dots that represent a possible planet. It is a fun and easy project, and you might just get the joy of discovering a new planet! 

March 14, 2017 - Happy Pi Day to all my nerdy mathematics friends!

March 1, 2017 - And the people at galaxyzoo.org have released another really interesting distributed science project, this time helping particle physicists and astrophysicists to identify high energy muons coming from space. It is a fun and easy project, and can be found at http://muonhunter.org

February 21, 2017 - Another interesting announcement from NASA today in regards to the search for exoplanets. Using a combination of several ground based telescopes together with the Hubble and Spitzer space telescopes, the team has discovered seven new planets, each of which is roughly Earth sized, and orbiting a star a mere 39 lightyears away from the Earth. At such a close distance, and with a significant number of warm, Earth sized planets, this system could become very important to the study of planetary formation in the coming years. It is really a great discovery!

February 14, 2017 - Happy Valentine's Day Everyone. I hope you can all spend it with someone you love, even if you are alone.

February 13, 2017 - For those of you who enjoy both astronomy and participating in genuine scientific research, NASA has funded a new website called BackyardWorlds that will allow users to look at infrared images from one of their telescopes, and help the astronomers to find objects in the outer fringes of the solar system. It is a fun way to kill some time, and you might just go into the history books as the discoverer of some interesting new planetary object! 

February 6, 2017 - Due to the "Victoria Blizzard" (which amounts to 4" of snow but shuts the city down) I won't be able to get out of my house today, and so I am going to have to reschedule all meeting for the next two days. Sorry for any inconvenience.

January 26, 2017 - I really don't like to get political on my websites, but I think that the March For Science movement is too important to ignore. Details can be found on their Facebook page.

January 25, 2017 - It is so wonderful to live in a country where we can celebrate all cultures and festivities in freedom. Tonight it is Burns Day and haggis in honour of my Scottish heritage! 

January 21, 2017 - Another strange occurrence today - I was talking to a friend today who told me that he had posted a message to my Facebook account, and it was deleted shortly after by someone using my account. Then another person told me that they had sent some e-mails to my mother last week and it seems that those were also deleted by someone accessing her account. There is one suspect who had access to both accounts, but I hesitate to name him (although many of you already know who I mean). In any case, if any of you have sent me a message that wasn't acknowledged, it is probably because of this hacker causing more trouble. I don't know what to suggest other than to send it again and hopefully I will receive it before it gets deleted this time!

January 1, 2017 - HAPPY NEW YEAR!!