Dr. Alex Fullerton (Ultraviolet Astronomy) is a support astronomer for the Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic Explorer (FUSE) satellite at Johns Hopkins University. His research involves spectroscopic analysis of the atmospheres of hot, luminous stars, with special emphasis on understanding the processes that make these objects variable.

Ultraviolet light comes from intrinsically hot sources in the universe, like early-type stars, stellar chromospheres, white dwarfs, and accretion disks around compact objects. Although the ultraviolet spectrum contains many intrinsically strong lines from a variety of atoms and ions, astronomers could not exploit these diagnostics until the dawn of the space age, simply because the earth's atmosphere strongly absorbs the short wavelengths characteristic of ultraviolet light. However, since the mid-1960's there has been an explosion of data returned from ultraviolet satellite observatories.

In this presentation, Alex will review the astrophysical information conveyed by ultraviolet light, and will highlight the contributions of specific satellites - both past (e.g., Copernicus, IUE) and present (HST, FUSE) - to our understanding of the gas, stars, and galaxies that comprise the luminous universe.