Alberto Cordero: Starry Night, An Open Door to Presenting Science

The Starry Night is like a “little door” that invites and encourages those interested in science to enter. Once again, on the night of Saturday, December 3, the doors to science opened to the hundreds of people who gathered at UAP for this annual event focused on science publishing.

United and at the same time dispersed in the fields of Engineering and Physical Mathematical Sciences of Ciudad Universitaria (CU), Enjoy attending For celestial observations through 150 telescopes, in addition to 150 workshops and experiments, and many lectures given by research professors, as well as the participation of a thousand university students.

For Alberto Cordero Davila, a researcher in the UAP’s College of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, events such as the Starry Night are like opening a door, convinced that although scientists have their own lives that make them think about science, the key moment is to look for an open door to enter.

“Here, these doors appear to people: they open and they go into the laboratory, and they see that it is possible to make a telescope, a microscope. They are small doors that open and it is an opportunity to open them,” he noted during an interview after the opening ceremony.

He pointed out that this year under the umbrella The motto of science, support for development, The Starry Night is an act of calling to ask oneself, to society in general, that Supporting development should not be profit but development of population, without destroying the planet, without making the poor poorer.

Basic science puts its batteries into something and tries to figure it out. A good example of this is the basic scientific research carried out in the fields of microbiology and virology that allowed a vaccine to be made available within one year – against Covid-19-, which prevented more people from dying. said the author of From the Classroom to the Universe, which has made it possible for about a thousand schools in the country to have at least one King telescope.

It was also considered that Star night It highlights the way university students, who receive nothing in return, who are a part of this and are waiting for the call, join up later to participate in experiments and workshops and make their telescopes available.

“These same people, as part of the community, pull their family and friends, and it’s been happening for over a decade that the same people here are the ones who invite and pull and push,” explains Cabrillo de Oro laureate Laureate Cabrillo de Oro. As part of the international scientific collaboration of the Pierre Auger Ultra-Energy Cosmic Ray Observatory.

The Knowledge, which is a public and global good

At the opening ceremony of CU’s Starry Night, organized by the Faculty of Mathematical Physical Sciences (FCFM), the Faculty of Computing, the Vice-Chancellor for Extension and Culture Dissemination, and the Institute of Social and Human Sciences “Alfonso Vélez Pliego”, in addition to other academic units, explained the Vice-Chancellor for Research and Graduate Studies Ignacio Martinez Laguna, that the law refers to pattern For the university about publishing and scientific publishing.

On behalf of Chancellor Lilia Cedillo and accompanied by the Vice-Chancellor for Culture, José Carlos Bernal, he said that the theme for 2022, Science, supporting development, shows that development today can only be explained by knowledge, which is a global public good, generated in a sector and brought into society, as is the case with the Starry Night, which arranges what UAP is born into knowledge.

In turn, Martha Alicia Palomino Ovando, Director of FCFM, highlighted the joint work between faculties and academic units to achieve this starry night, which took place not only in the city of Puebla but in other places located in municipalities such as Cuautlancingo, Chignahuapan, San Andrés Cholula, Huaquechula and Zacatlán and Izúcar de Matamoros, among others.

Incidentally, José Eduardo Espinosa, Director of International Development for the UAP, mentioned that face to face, Starry Night 2022 allows workshop leaders, lecturers and telescope directors to offer their knowledge to attendees, along with “all the beauty and magic of science.”

In turn, Gregorio Rogelio Cruz, coordinator of astronomy training for the UAP Universe class, said that with more than 150 telescopes installed, on a partly cloudy Saturday night, deep space objects – such as clusters of stars, a galaxy and many nebulae – and cosmic objects can be seen Nearby planets such as the Moon, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn.