Dahlonega Science Festival

Enjoy science and technology? For science enthusiasts, NASA engineers will talk about jet propulsion systems and mark this year's 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing. All science festival events are free on a first-come, first-served basis while the literary festival is mostly free but features three ticketed events. The science festival will cover a wide range of fields including biology, chemistry, physics, astronomy, and the earth sciences.

NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory engineers Trina Ray and Kim Steadman will headline the Dahlonega Science Festival. Ray will speak at 7 p.m. March 1 between a pair of shows at the George E. Coleman Sr. Planetarium at 6 and 8 p.m. She has been part of the Voyager and Cassini missions with NASA. Steadman has worked on the Mars 2020 Rover and the Mars Science Laboratory. Both Ray and Steadman will speak at a variety of other events during the weekend.

Other speakers and events at the Dahlonega Science Festival will include:

• Marshall Shepherd, a University of Georgia (UGA) meteorologist and climatologist and host of the award-winning "Weather Geeks" talk show on the Weather Channel
• UGA entomologist Marianne Shockley
• Georgia Tech's John Wise, who specializes in black holes
• Larry Young from Emory University's Center for Translational Social Neuroscience
• Russell Cutts, Emory University anthropology faculty member
• Kid-friendly shows and hands-on activities including planetarium shows, forensics lab, makers fair, the science of the circus, discovery center, and an escape room.

For a full list of science festival events, view the event program provided in the website link on this page.