Jack Ireland

Job: European Space Agency Research Fellow, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, USA
Born:Hamilton, Scotland 1969.

a moving eyeball And how did you end up where you are now?
Err, long story. I remember being told in primary school that there were three states of matter - solid, liquid and gas. But I'd read somewhere that there was a fourth state of matter called plasma. So I was kind of curious as to why the teacher never told us about it. I found out more about plasmas at the school astronomy club - the Sun is a big ball of plasma and so are most other stars. After finishing my Ph. D. I moved to St. Andrews to learn more about the Sun. One thing led to another: I applied for a job with the European Space Agency (ESA, logo on the right) that involves working at NASA.


Page turning book And what do you work on?
I'm trying to understand why the Sun's corona is at a temperature of over 1,000,000 degrees when the Sun's surface is only 6,000 degrees. I take observations using instruments on the SOHO spacecraft and try to understand what I see.


In your spare time?
I like cycling - mountain biking and road racing, and playing football. I also started to play golf at St. Andrews, but I'm still pretty hopeless at it. I'm also trying to bake the perfect waffle, which (trust me) is very difficult.



Are these perfect waffles?

Which person, living or dead, would you most like to meet?

Stravinsky
conducting...or throwing left hook? I think it would have to be Igor Stravinsky (pictured left). He was a composer who came to fame after the first performance of the ballet `The Rite of Spring' in Paris, 1910. Igor Stravinsky wrote the music to go along with the ballet. The audience rioted after the ballet had finished!!! Remember the audience was full of the poshest, richest Parisians around. I guess in 1910 they were pretty posh. And yet they acted like the a bunch of hooligans at a football match getting really angry at their team losing a game 5-0 to some non-league side, relegating them to a rubbish division! I mean, what got into those people?

Anyway, I'd like to ask Igor if he expected such a reaction (after all, it was just a ballet and some music!) and if he managed to get a couple of punches in.

I'd also like to meet the person reading this and ask them the same question!



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