Space Cafe Tokyo, July 2026

Space Cafe Tokyo returns to Good Heavens British Bar in Shimokitazawa for a talk titled "Cosmic Mirages: Probing the Dark Universe". Dr. Ana Acebron of the Instituto de Física de Cantabria explains strong gravitational lensing, the effect where the gravitational field of a massive foreground object such as a galaxy or a galaxy cluster deflects and magnifies light from a far more distant object behind it. When the effect is strong enough, multiple images of the same background galaxy appear at once. The talk covers what these cosmic mirages can tell us about the dark Universe: how they are used to measure how fast the Universe is expanding, and how they can even be used to predict when and where the next supernova will appear. Dr. Acebron completed her PhD in Marseille in 2017, held postdoctoral positions at Ben Gurion University and the University of Milan, and joined the Instituto de Física de Cantabria as a Beatriz Galindo Fellow in late 2023. Doors open at 7:30pm and the speaker starts at 8pm. Tickets are sold at the door for 1,500 yen in cash, which covers the first drink.