The annual Cline Observatory Jo Cline Memorial Astronomy Day Lecture features a prominent researcher in astronomy, astrophysics, or planetary science. The lecture is held each fall in Koury Auditorium at GTCC's Jamestown Campus. It is free and open to the public.
2026 Jo Cline Memorial Lecture
A free public lecture at 7 p.m. Friday, October 2.University of Virginia Astronomer Dr Kelsey Johnon will give the 2026 Jo Cline Memorial Lecture on Friday, October 2nd in the Koury Auditorium, building 19 on the Jamestown campus map. The physical address is 621 E. Main St., Jamestown, NC, 27282. Guests should park in Lot F.
At the Edge of Knowing: Science and the Mysteries of the Cosmos
Kelsey Johnson, University of Virginia
About the talk: What caused the Big Bang? What happens inside a black hole? Did time have a beginning? Are there parts of the universe—or aspects of reality—that may forever remain beyond our reach?
Astronomer Kelsey Johnson takes us to the edge of scientific understanding, where some of the biggest questions in cosmology begin to blur the boundaries between science, philosophy, and theology. Along the way, she will explore not only what we know about the universe, but how we know it: how scientists make progress when direct answers seem impossible, what we do when evidence runs out, and whether there may be fundamental limits to human understanding. Ultimately, the mysteries of the cosmos raise a question every bit as profound as the mysteries themselves: How much of the universe are we capable of knowing?
About the speaker: Dr. Kelsey Johnson teaches students both inside and outside of the classroom, using astronomy as a gateway science to nurture curiosity and support science literacy. As a child, Johnson spent countless nights outside under the stars, where she developed a love for "big picture" questions about the nature of reality and the universe. Johnson's curiosity about the cosmos - and everything in it - has been the primary driver of her career, leading her to devote her life to learning, exploration, and teaching.
Dr. Johnson is a professor at the University of Virginia and founding director of the award-winning Dark Skies Bright Kids program. She has won numerous awards for her research, teaching, and promotion of science literacy. Her TED talk on the importance of dark skies has more than 2 million views, and her writing has appeared in nationwide publications, including the New York Times, Scientific American, and Washington Post. Her children’s book Constellations for Kids is consistently in the top 10 children’s astronomy books. Johnson is the past-president of the American Astronomical Society.
The Jo Cline Memorial Astronomy Day Lecture is made possible, in part, by an endowment established by Don Cline in September 2015 with an initial funding goal of $50,000. Interest from the endowment provides annual ongoing support of the Jo Cline Fall Astronomy Lecture Series. Cline will match, dollar for dollar, contributions made to this fund until our goal is reached.
Please consider honoring Jo’s memory by contributing to the fund. For information about and donations to the Jo Cline Endowment, visit our Support the Observatory page.
Past Lectures
2025
Grant Tremblay,Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, "The Sky & Other Ghosts: Our Fading Age of Discovery."
2024
Dan Scolnic, Duke University, "How We Measure the Expansion Rate of the Universe and What Could Be Wrong with our Standard Model." Click here to watch a video of this presentation.
2023
Rogier Windhorst, Arizona State University, "World of Webb, and Seeing through the Eyes of Einstein" Click here to watch a video of this presentation.
2022
Rebekah Dawson, Penn State University, "Beyond Eta Earth: Exoplanets as a Window on the History and Habitability of Planetary Systems" Click here to watch a video of this presentation.
2021
Sheperd S. Doeleman, Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics/EHT, "First Pictures of a Black Hole! Imaging a Black Hole with the Event Horizon Telescope"
2020
No Lecture held in 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic
2019
Cathy Olkin, SWRI, "Exploring the Outer Reaches of Our Solar System"
2018
Gabriela González, LSU/LIGO, “Einstein, Gravitational Waves, Black Holes, and Other Matters
2017
John Mather, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, “The History of the Universe from the Beginning to the End: Where Did We Come From, Where Can We Go?”
2016
David Charbonneau, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, “How to Find an Inhabited Exoplanet”
2015
Sean Solomon, Director, Lamont-Doherty Earth Institute, and Principal Investigator for the Mercury MESSENGER Mission, “The MESSENGER Spacecraft Mission to Mercury: Surprises from the Innermost Planet”
2014
Jocelyn Bell Burnell, University of Oxford, “The Last and Next 100 Years in Astronomy“
2013
Don Winget, University of Texas at Austin, “Small Stars in a Large Context: All Things White Dwarf”
2012
Bob Benjamin, University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, “A Visitor’s Guide to the Milky Way Galaxy“
2011
Francis Halzen, University of Wisconsin-Madison / IceCube, “Ice Fishing for Neutrinos“
2010
Giovanni Fazio, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics / Spitzer, “Viewing the Universe with Infrared Eyes: the Spitzer Space Telescope“
2009
Hal Levison, Southwest Research Institute, “What Planets Are and How they Form“
2008
Neil Gehrels, NASA Goddard / Swift Mission, “Black Holes: From Einstein to Gamma Ray Bursts“
2007
Michael Turner, University of Chicago, “The Dark Side of the Universe“
2006
Scott Ransom, NRAO-Charlottesville, “The Stellar Undead“
2005
Jeff Hester, Arizona State University, “From the Big Bang to Big Brains: the Evolution of Structure in the Universe“
2004
Paul Butler, Carnegie Institute, “Extrasolar Planets: a First Reconnaissance“
2003
Prasun Desai, NASA Langley, “Mars Exploration in the Coming Decade“
2002
Steve Murray, Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics / Chandra, “X-ray Astronomy Comes of Age: the Chandra x-ray Observatory View of the Cosmos“
2001
Jay Bergstralh, NASA Langley, “The Galilean Satellites of Jupiter“
2000
Virginia Trimble, Univ. Cal-Irvine / Univ. Maryland, “Cosmology: Man’s Place in the Universe“
1999
Robert Kirshner, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, “The Universe: Big, Old, and Accelerating“
1998
John Wood, NASA Goddard, “Resolution: Latest Results from the Hubble Space Telescope“
1997
Bruce Carney, UNC-Chapel Hill, “How Old is Our Universe?“