Local news outlets have reported on the large crowds who came to USM to view the solar eclipse on Monday.

USM's Edward Gleason, who manages the Southworth Planetarium, was quoted in a Boston Globe story anticipating the Aug. 21 total eclipse of the sun. "This might be the most watched eclipse in human history, that is the claim being made in astronomy circles anyway," he told the Globe.

Cutting edge exploration into the way people communicate — and how their brains interact — will be the focus of a lecture by Dr. Joy Hirsch, a neuroscientist with the Yale School of Medicine. Her talk, titled "When Two Brains Collide," will be held at 7 p.m. on Friday, May 5 at USM's Southworth Planetarium on the Portland Campus.