Professor Ian Crawford gives a talk on Starship Destinations
Professor Crawford explores our long term future in space at the 2013 Starship Century symposium.
Professor Ian Crawford was among those invited to talk at this year’s Starship Century symposium, held in San Diego, May 21-22 2013. The event is organised by the Arthur C. Clarke Centre for Human Imagination. Speakers, who included both scientists and science fiction writers, explored the prospects for our long term future in space.
In collaboration with the science fiction author Stephen Baxter, Ian has written a chapter on the same subject for the conference’s publication 'Starship Century: Toward the Grandest Horizon' edited by James and Gregory Benford, Microwave Sciences/Lucky Bat Books, 2013.
Researching lunar exploration and astrobiology
Ian is Professor of Planetary Science and Astrobiology in Birkbeck’s Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, where his research focuses on lunar exploration and the new science of astrobiology, the study of the astronomical and planetary context of the origin of life. Professor Crawford is a strong believer in the scientific necessity for resuming human exploration of the Moon, extending this to Mars and, eventually, interstellar travel. As he succinctly puts it: ‘By the time we are ready to build starships we will know where to send them.’
Professor Crawford recently gave his inaugural lecture on Moon, Mars and the Search for Life in the Universe. You can read some of the highlights from this event from Jane MacArthur’s live tweets (@Jane_MacArthur), collected here on her blog.