Dr Evan Keane is a Project Scientist for the Square Kilometre Array Organisation, where he is focusing on Pulsars, Transients & Solar/Heliopheric science. He has already had an exciting career in astronomy, where he had initially completed his PhD here at Jodrell Bank regarding ͞The Transient Radio Sky’. From there on Evan went to work in Bonn, Germany as a postdoctoral researcher before moving down-under to work as a CAASTRO Senior Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Swinburne University of Technology in Melbourne where he was the CAASTRO Dynamic Theme Scientist. Along with being a Project Scientist, Evan is also involved in various working groups that are focused on certain specifications needed for the SKA, those being the Central Signal Processor, essentially the ͞brain͟ of the SKA, and the Signal and Data Transport group, which will be the digital backbone of the telescope. Outside of work Evan is a keen sportsman, having played basketball for Ireland and participating in long distance running events such as the Great Manchester Run.

Explosions in Space

Looking up at the beautiful Cheshire sky on a clear night you might get the impression that the Universe is a peaceful place. The truth is that the Universe is chaotic with high energy explosions occurring every minute. Some of these are so powerful that they would wipe out the human civilisation if they occurred close enough to Earth! In this talk I will describe various kinds of explosions in space, how we find them, what they teach us about the Universe, and whether or not we need to run and hide.