Integrated Calendar

Sexual reproduction has many costs -- especially the existence of lots of males.
But sex, or more generally exchange of DNA, is widely believed to have major advantages for evolution. Yet most of the arguments are rather qualitative: with the multiple large and small numbers involved in evolutionary processes, quantitative understanding is essential.
Some of the general questions and theoretical challenges they present will be discussed, including analyses of seemingly simple aspects of sexual evolution and the potential for probing these with microbial evolution experiments.

In the Solar system, the planets follow orbits that are aligned with
the Sun's equatorial plane to within a few degrees. But what about
planets around other stars? Recently we have measured the spin-orbit
angles of about 50 stars with exoplanets, using a technique first
theorized in the 19th century, as well as several new techniques based
on data from the NASA Kepler spacecraft. Many exoplanetary systems
have good alignment, as in the Solar system - but there are also many
surprises. I will discuss these results and their implications for
theories of planet formation, and tidal spin-orbit interactions.
I will also describe the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite, an MIT-led
NASA mission that will improve upon Kepler by discovering exoplanets around
stars that are brighter, closer to the Earth, and easier to study.