Sep 22-26, 2025
Los Altos High School
Elinor Gates
Astronomer
Untwinkling the Stars
Getting sharp images through a telescope is essential for learning about the universe and the diverse objects in it. Ground-based telescopes look through Earth's turbulent atmosphere, which blurs the images. Adaptive Optics is a technology that allows astronomers to "untwinkle" the stars to get sharper images to help unravel the mysteries of the universe.
Meet the Speaker:
Dr. Elinor Gates is a staff astronomer at Lick Observatory, specializing in laser guide star adaptive optics and near infrared camera instrumentation and observations. She did her undergraduate studies, majoring in Mathematics and Astrophysics, at Mount Holyoke College. She received her Ph.D. in Physics/Astronomy from the University of New Mexico in 1998. Before moving to Lick Observatory, she worked at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, IAU Minor Planet Center, the National Radio Astronomy Observatory, and the Air Force Phillips Laboratory. Dr. Gates’s current research interests are studying quasars and their host galaxies, discovering dust-obscured quasars, and measuring the masses of quasar and AGN central black holes. Asteroid (2650) Elinor is named in Dr. Gates’s honor.