Dr. Ilia Roussev will give a talk entitled "Stormy Weather in Space" at 6:30 p.m. Feb. 15 sponsored by the University of Hawai'i Institute for Astronomy at the Maikalani building in Pukalani, Maui.

Even on calm days, the sun hurls into space a billion-ton cloud of charged particles about once every 48 hours. These large-scale mass ejections from the solar atmosphere are associated with flares. The charged particles that strike our planet can disrupt satellites and knock out electrical power.

Along with intense X-ray radiation from flares, they can also endanger astronauts. For these and other reasons, it is important to understand and predict the ever-changing environmental conditions in outer space due to solar storms — the "space weather." This talk presents our current understanding of space weather and our attempts to forecast it.

Roussev is an assistant astronomer with expertise in solar physics at the University of Hawai'i Institute for Astronomy. He obtained a master's degree in physics and astronomy from the Physics Department of Sofia University in his native Bulgaria in 1995 and his doctorate in physics from the Queen's University at Belfast (Northern Ireland) in 2001. An expert in computational modeling of the solar atmosphere and solar wind, he joined UH's Institute for Astronomy faculty in 2006.

Prior to that, Roussev worked at the High Altitude Observatory in Boulder, Colo., and at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Mich. He has co-authored more than 60 scientific papers, is an active participant in numerous professional organizations, and has co-organized a number of professional meetings and summer schools for graduate students.

The address of Maikalani, also known as the Advanced Technology Research Center, is 34 Ohia Ku St., Pukalani, above Kamehameha Schools in the Kulamalu Town Center (the first light after King Kekaulike High School, just off Kula Highway). For a map, go to www.ifa.hawaii.edu/maps/Maui-ATRC.html.

Admission is free, and street parking is available. For more information, call 808-573-9500 on Maui.

Founded in 1967, the Institute for Astronomy at the UH-Manoa conducts research into galaxies, cosmology, stars, planets and the sun. Its faculty and staff are also involved in astronomy education, deep space missions, and in the development and management of the observatories on Haleakala and Mauna Kea.