Spotlight: Astrophysicist Neil DeGasse Tyson

(Cropped and flipped NASA photo - 2005) 

Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson made news headlines when it was reported that Titanic, the movie, had to be altered because he found a flaw in one sky scene. Tyson noted that the stars could not have been in the sky in that position in 1912, so the film's producer, James Cameron, had them digitally altered. The changes to the film were made before it was re-released in 3-D.  

Tyson was born on October 5, 1958 in Manhattan, N.Y. According to Tyson's vitae on the American Museum of Natural History site, his professional research includes star formations, exploding stars, dwarf galaxies, and the structure of the Milky Way. His data is obtained by looking through multiple telescopes in major planetariums. He published the article "The High-Redshift Distribution of Starburst Galaxies in the COSMOS Field" in 2006.

Tyson holds a BA degree in physics from Harvard, a MA in astronomy from the University of Texas at Austin, a MA in astrophysics from Columbia as well as a PhD. from there in astrophysics. 

Major influences in his life were his mother, Sunchita Feliciano Tyson, a gerontologist,  his father, Cyril deGrasse Tyson, a sociologist; Carl Sagan and Fred C. Hess, both astronomers.