Dr. Pauline Barmby is a Professor in the Department of Physics & Astronomy at Western University in London, Ontario and currently serves as co-chair of the Canadian Astronomy 2020 Long Range Plan, otherwise known as LRP2020. LRP2020 reviews the field of astronomy and astrophysics, along with associated education, training, and outreach programs. The resulting plan will serve as a single unified vision for the highest priority projects in astronomy in Canada over the period 2020 to 2030. Dr. Barmby came to Western from the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory after completing her studies at Harvard University, where she worked on the Spitzer Space Telescope and used it to study topics including distant galaxies and variable stars in the Milky Way. Her current research focuses on nearby galaxies, particularly the Andromeda galaxy (M31) and other galaxies in our Local Group. Dr. Barmby has also been regarded as quite the problem solver among faculty at Western University, having served as Associate Dean of graduate and postdoctoral studies in the Faculty of Science at Western and was the Acting Dean of Science. The music for this episode is titled "Complicated" by Toronto-based musician, Chris Oday. Artwork for the show was created by Gladys Ng. Her portfolio can be viewed at gladysng.ca Support Stage 2 by donating to their Tip Jar: https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/stage-2

Christopher Cochrane is Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Toronto and principal Investigator of the Linked Parliamentary Data project. He is the author of Left and Right: The Small World of Political Ideas (MQUP, 2015) and co-author, with Kelly Blidook and Rand Dyck, of Canadian Politics: Critical Approaches (Nelson, 2016). Cochrane and colleagues run the Linked Parliamentary Data Project, otherwise known as LIPAD, which is digitizing and analyzing the written record of debate in the Canadian House of Commons. Transcripts of Canadian political debate, known as Hansard, dates back 150 years in Canada’s history, before even the birth of the typewriter. The LIPAD team estimates that it would take almost 100 years to read all of the records from the House and the Senate, which is why they are now creating the first-ever machine-readable and fully searchable open database for every word that has been uttered in the House of Commons. They’re constantly updating their database, organizing by policy topics, and tagging demographic data, such as gender and party of politicians who have spoken in the House of Commons. The music for this episode is titled "Complicated" by Toronto-based musician, Chris Oday. Artwork for the show was created by Gladys Ng. Her portfolio can be viewed at gladysng.ca Support Stage 2 by donating to their Tip Jar: https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/stage-2