Astrophysics Earthly Applications

Federica Bianco gave a keynote about how astrophysics methodologies can be applied to solve problems related to urban science. Bianco is a professor of astrophysics, and she studies stellar explosions. She is also a cross-disciplinary scientist and leverages her background to look at new ways to improve urban environments.

Federica Bianco opens her keynote by stating the fact that all discoveries in astrophysics were derived form images and videos. Bianco states that in the field of astrophysics, simple solutions are often implemented to gain insights about large amounts of data.

Bianco then questions whether these astrophysics methodologies could be used to solve issues on earth, she then states that the Urban Observatory attempts to do this very thing. Bianco outlines how she used images of lights to predict the energy needs of a city. Additionally, she used daytime images of plumes to study pollution in cities. Measuring pollution can be done using sensors, however, using mathematical models and networks can be a more cost-effective way to study urban pollution.

Federica Bianco concludes her keynote by stating that these methodologies can be used for all types of urban science data.