Harvard from afar: Geographically to socially distanced
For Marion Dierickx, living in a socially distanced world is nothing new. In fact, she does it for two to three months every year in one of the most extreme conditions on Earth: the South Pole. Dierickx ’12, A.M. ’14, Ph.D. ’17, is a postdoctoral fellow in the Cosmic Microwave Background Group at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. Every year she and some colleagues take the 9,000-mile journey from Cambridge to the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station to build and maintain the BICEP/Keck microwave telescopes there. Life on the ice feels a lot like life in the U.S. during the coronavirus pandemic. “In some sense, they are complete opposites but, in general, there’s also very clear parallels,” Dierickx said. “Here, you have to shelter in place because the outside is a dangerous place … venturing outside carries risk. You can’t forget your mask, your gloves. You steer clear of other people and heading...