35th Annual Report (2022-2023) - ENGLISH

178 2. Seminar on James Webb space Telescope for school Students- June 25, 2022 A seminar on 'James Webb space Telescope' was conducted on 25th June 2022 at 9 am. Dr. Joe Jacob, coordinator of ICARD and former Head of the Department of Physics of Newman College delivered the talk. The session detailed the revolutionary changes in the understanding of the Universe expected to be unravelled by the James Web Telescope. Forty school students from the region participated in the Seminar. 3. Celebration of Moon Day – July 27, 2022 Department of Physics, Newman College Thodupuzha commemorated 'International Moon Day 2022' on th 27 July 2022 at the auspices of ICARD. As a curtain-raiser for the celebrations, an inter-departmental Quiz competition was conducted on th 27 July, at 10.30 am. Twenty-nine teams from various departments participated in the preliminary round and four teams were selected for the final round. The meeting which followed was presided over by Dr. Saju Abraham and felicitated by Dr. Joe Jacob. A talk on “Citizen Science Program: Research at Home” was delivered by Ms. Vijayalakshmi V., a former student. Prizes and certificates were distributed to the winners of the Quiz competition. The event was attended by nearly a hundred undergraduate students. fig 2: (a) Dr. Joe Jacob falicitating the moon day celebrations meeting (b) The poster for the moon day celebrations 4. Skywatchprogrammeon September28,2022andFebruary7,2023 (a) JupiterObservation: (b) Cometobservation A skywatch programme was conducted at Newman College under the auspices of ICARD to watch the event of the closest approach of planet Jupiter to earth on the th 28 of September 2022, using the Celestron 11'' telescope. Another skywatch programme for observing the comet ZTF was conducted on the th 7 of February Mr. Sudheesh Thankappan, and Mr. Krishnaprasad K. R, Research scholars of the Department were the resource persons and Dr. Indu Sebastian and Dr. Riya Sebastian were the coordinators of the program. The programme was attended by the students from the college and the neighbouring schools and also by the public. It motivated many questions and was indeed an enlightening experience for the participants. 5. Seminar on Safe Observation of SolarEclipse-October25,2022 T o a b o l i s h t h e m y t h s a n d superstitions regarding solar eclipses among the public, the Department of Physics organized a seminar on 25 th of October 2022. Dr. Beena Ma r y J o hn d e l i v e r e d a t a l k detailing the prevalent myths and superstitions on eclipse and the scientific counterarguments against it. She also explained how to safely observe the eclipse with demonstrations of the various methods.