Event 1: UCLA Meteorite Gallery

For my first event, I visited the Meteorite Gallery that is located in the Geology building at UCLA. This was a relatively small room, but it felt like you were walking into an exhibition at a science museum. At the time that I went, no one who worked there was present. However, that did not affect the knowledge I gained, since the descriptive captions throughout the gallery were enough to fill me in.

In this exhibition, I observed many different kinds meteorites, all of them were fascinating to look at, since you were literally looking at the history and composition of the solar system.

Display of some of the beautiful meteorites.
I noticed that a lot of these meteorites are rather artistic and grab one's attention when looking at them. A thought that came to my mind when trying to relate this gallery to the topics learned in class was that if it wasn't for that aesthetically-pleasing aspect of these meteorites, perhaps people would not feel as inclined to study them. Studying these materials gives us a lot of information about the history and composition of the earth, the solar system and beyond.

I went with a friend, and she pointed out how a lot of the metallic-looking meteorites look like something "futuristic" or like the scraps and remains of a spaceship.
Picture of the "futuristic" looking rocks that are on display at the gallery.


Display of meteorites from space that were found on Earth, and a map of the asteroid belt's position in space.


I found this gallery to be really interesting, and being an astrophysics major, I had fun being able to connect some of the knowledge I already knew to other details I learned about in this gallery.

Me at the entrance of the gallery.

Overall, I feel like this gallery is a perfect demonstration of science and art being merged together, which is something I feel was stressed on a lot throughout the topics of this class. I would definitely recommend other students to visit the gallery, especially because it is free, and easily accessible on the UCLA campus.







Sources

Hamilton, Rosanna L. “Meteoroids and Meteorites.” Views of the Solar System, 2012, solarviews.com/eng/meteor.htm.

"Meteorite Collection.” UCLA, meteorites.ucla.edu/.

Prado, Asari. Meteorite Display. 23 April 2019.
Prado, Asari. Futuristic Rocks Display. 23 April 2019.
Prado, Asari. Meteorites and Map. 23 April 2019.
Prado, Asari. Picture with the Entrance Sign. 23 April 2019.































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