Profile: Prof. Kris Davidson

In the last several years, I have worked intensively on the supermassive star Eta Carina, which in its great eruption 160 years ago, ejected an enormous mass (10-20 times that of our sun) into space. In a short period of time, astronomically speaking, the star itself may finally die in a supernova explosion. The Hubble Space Telescope (HST) has designated our study of Eta Carina as one of its Treasury Projects, devoting large amounts of time to studying its variations.

Profile: Prof. Robert Gehrz

I'm enthralled by dirt -- at least the astronomical kind. The dust out of which our planet formed, originally came from the stars. For many years, I have been studying the conditions under which this dust condenses out of hotter gases. Novae, for example, are stars that undergo non-fatal explosions that expel enormous amounts of dust into space. I have played major roles in the decades-long planning and development of the Spitzer Infrared Telescope, now bringing us spectacular images of our dusty space environment. I am looking forward to using the infrared-optimized LBT to study dust in interesting systems such as the RY Scuti binary system, with two stars orbiting each other so closely that they touch.

Profile: Prof. Roberta Humphreys

My research spans the structure of our Milky Way to the study of the populations of massive stars here and in nearby galaxies. I use our own in-house database of a 100 million objects to map the structure of our galaxy and observations with the Steward telescopes to study the "supernova imposters," which are very massive stars expelling large amounts of matter into space.

Profile: Prof. Larry Rudnick

I'm interested in the extremely high energy particles generated in shock waves, both in giant clusters of galaxies on scales up to millions of light years, and in the smaller explosions of dying stars, as they create supernova remnants. I study these systems using radio, optical, X-ray and infrared images and spectra from both ground- and space-based telescopes.

Profile: Prof. Evan Skillman

Understanding how galaxies are formed and evolve presents arguably the biggest challenge for astrophysics in the next decade. As new observing facilities come on-line, we can look back to the earliest ages of our universe and learn more about galaxies in their infancy. I am currently conducting a parallel approach by studying the nearest dwarf galaxies which are the most numerous galaxies in the Universe and the likely building blocks of all galaxies. Like an archaeologist, I reconstruct their lives by exploring the fossil records by measuring the ages, metallicities, and distributions of their oldest stars.

Profile: Prof. Liliya Williams

I am interested in the distribution of "dark matter" in the Universe, on scales ranging from sub-galactic to those larger than clusters of galaxies. Dark matter is the dominant matter component in the Universe, yet its nature has eluded us so far. I study gravitational lensing of high redshift sources, and dynamics of individual galaxies and clusters, to gain detailed knowledge of the clustering properties of dark matter.

Profile: Prof. Chick Woodward

One focus of my current research is the study of solar system comets, which are frozen reservoirs of primitive solar dust grains and ices. I analyze the composition and size distribution of cometary dust grains from infrared imaging and polarimetry techniques using the LBT and Steward Observatory telescopes which support my Spitzer Infrared Telescope activities. In this way, I can determine the physical characteristics of the solid materials that constituted the primitive solar nebula, out of which planetesimals, then planets, and eventually we, ourselves, were formed.

Profile: Prof. Paul Woodward

Deep inside a star, the churning and the transfer of massive amounts of energy are not open to direct observation. However, through the use of sophisticated physical models and numerical simulations on supercomputers, we can investigate how these invisible processes work. Recently, we have been concentrating on the convection processes in stars near the end of their red giant phases. Our observational colleagues can search for the subtle signatures of these processes, and improve our understanding of the hidden interiors of stars.

Profile: Prof. Terry Jones

I am an infrared astronomer who specializes in measuring the polarization of light. This type of observation can reveal the structure of dust in comets, the magnetic field geometry in galaxies and pinpoint the location of hidden stars. Specialized observing procedures are required, but a few major facilities such as the NASA IRTF and the Hubble Space Telescope have a polarimetric capability I am able to use. We are building a precision infrared imaging polarimeter for use on the MMT in combination with the AO secondary.

Profile: Prof. Tom Jones

I do research in theoretical and computational astrophysics, mainly addressing problems associated with very energetic phenomena and their impact on the universe. My students and I carry out large fluid dynamical simulations including specially developed routines to follow the microphysics responsible for the emission we observe from such astronomical objects as supernova remnants, active galaxies and clusters of galaxies. Our calculations can be compared directly with observational data to test basic theories about the origins of these objects.

Profile: Dr. Sebastian Hidalgo

My research is focused on the star formation history of dwarf galaxies and their extended structures (low surface brightness regions at relative distance from the center). This give us reliable information about how stellar populations of dwarf galaxies evolve as a function of the metallicity and time. Extended structures of dwarf galaxies are fossil records of the first stages of their evolution. Studing the star formation history and the distribution of the stellar populations of this extended structures would cast light on the formation and evolution of dwarf galaxies and, if they are the building blocks of the Unvierse, for other bigger galaxies. The color-magnitud diagram is the best tool to study and derive the star formation history. I work with deep HST data, synthetic color-magnitud diagrams and powerfull algorithms to obtain this information.

Profile: Crystal Austin

I am a 5th year graduate student working with Prof. Williams. My disertation uses semi-analytic and N-Body simulations to study dark matter halos.

Profile: Martha Boyer

I am a graduate student working with Chick Woodward, Bob Gehrz, and Evan Skillman. I use the Spitzer Space Telescope to study evolved stars in globular clusters and Local Group dwarf galaxies. The amount and composition of circumstellar dust around these stars reveal details about stellar mass loss, a vital component of galactic evolution. Mass loss in stars lacking heavy metals also teaches us about the mechanisms of dust production in the early universe, when the metals that dust grains condense from were scarce.

Profile: Shea Brown

It is predicted that a large fraction of the total baryons in the universe reside outside the well studied dense clusters of galaxies. Cosmological simulations show a universe where rich clusters and super-clusters of galaxies are connected by a diffuse "cosmic web" of sheets and filaments, but these regions are difficult to detect precisely because they are such low density environments. My research, in collaboration with Prof. Larry Rudnick, focuses on using non-thermal emission to detect and characterize these low density regions, using powerful telescopes such as the Very Large Array, the Greenbank Telescope, and the Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope array. Our current focus is on using polarization observations to detect very low surface brightness emission purportedly cause by shocks related to large scale structure formation.

Profile: Jennifer Delgado

I'm a first year graduate student with an interest in planet formation. In particular I am interested in the early solar system enviroment and extra-solar circumstellar dust disks.

Profile: Paul Edmon

I am a graduate student working for Tom Jones. We have developed a code that tells us the radiation from and energy losses to cosmic rays. We are currently using this code in conjunction with simulations of actual Supernova Remnants (such as SN 1006 and RX J1713.7-3946) to see if we can match the observed radiation coming from these sources. This helps us to verify our cosmic ray acceleration models and to understand how these interesting objects work. In the future we hope to use this code to model the radiation from other simulations that include cosmic rays, such as Jet Models and Cosmological Simulations.

Profile: Jessica Ennis

I am a second year graduate student working with Larry Rudnick on the young supernova remnants Cassiopeia A and Kepler. I use infrared and X-ray images and spectra of Cas A, as well as optical, X-ray, and radio observations of Kepler's supernova remnant, to understand the structures and physical processes occurring in the remains of these recently deceased stars. We are currently trying to understand how supernovae contribute to the dust content of the Universe, how elements formed in stars get incorporated into the interstellar medium, and what causes the assymmetries of supernova remnants.

Profile: Damon Farnsworth

I am a first year graduate student. I've recently been researching cosmology and gravitational lensing under Liliya Williams. My general research interests lie in the computational and theoretical aspects of cosmology, large-scale structure formation and evolution, and gravitational astrophysics. In my limited spare time I sleep and eat.

Profile: Andrew Helton

I am a graduate student working under the direction of Chick Woodward and Bob Gehrz. My research primarily involves the evolution of classical and recurrent novae using data obtained with the Spitzer Space Telescope and multiple ground based observatories including Gemini, IRTF and our own Mt. Lemmon Observatory. Ultimately, these observations should provide further insight into the physical processes involved in novae outbursts, the dynamics of the ejecta, the formation and evolution of dust, and how the ejected material interacts with the interstellar medium and contributes to local chemical enrichment.

Profile: Karl Isensee

I am a graduate student currently working with Prof. Larry Rudnick on the supernova remnant Cassiopeia A. I am most interested in medium and large scale X-Ray variability using data from the Chandra X-Ray Observatory. One aspect of my research is to observe detailed changes in the spectrum of Cassiopeia A. This can give us information about how Cassiopeia A's shocks interact with the ejecta from the supernova. I also supplement the X-Ray data with IR data from the Spitzer Space Telescope in order to further study radiative processes in this interesting astronomical object.

Profile: Kristy McQuinn

I am a 5th year graduate student working with Dr. Evan Skillman to determine the duration of starbursts in nearby dwarf galaxies. A starburst is an episode of intense star formation in a galaxy that affects not only the structure and evolution of the host galaxy but also the chemical composition of the galaxy's external environment (the intergalacitc medium). Understanding how long a starburst lasts requires a reconstruction of the galaxy's recent star formation history. The duration is an important and fundamental parameter in the study of starbursts because it affects much of the subsequent analysis and study of a starburst galaxy's evolution. Our work uses optical images from the Hubble Space Telescope of more than a dozen nearby dwarf systems and stellar evolution models to determine the rate of star formation over the past 1 billion years.

Profile: Pete Mendygral

I am a graduate student working under the supervision of Tom Jones in the computational astrophysics group. My current research utilizes high resolution simulations of radio jets to investigate the observational consequences of their interactions with the ICM. By including relativistic electron transport in the simulation, we have calculated synthetic radio and x-ray observations of these jets. Knowing the details of the physics in our simulations, observed properties can be directly related with physical quantities.

Profile: Michael Milligan

I am a member of the observational cosmology group working for Shaul Hanany to help fly the next generation of balloon-borne cosmic microwave background experiments. We hope to measure the polarization of the background radiation, which will yield better values for cosmological parameters, and should constrain inflationary models of the big bang. My current work deals principally with designing the optical systems to be used in these experiments, relying heavily on physical optics modeling to analyze optical performance.

Profile: Dan Polsgrove

I am a graduate student working in the observational cosmology group for Terry Jones and Shaul Hanany. Our goal is to fly the next generation balloon-borne cosmic microwave background experiment. We hope to measure the polarization of the background radiation, which will yield better values for cosmological parameters, and should constrain inflationary models of the big bang. I'm currently learning as much as possible about polarization as well as optical modeling and simulation, en route to designing a method by which to accurately calibrate the experiment's instrumentation prior to first flight.

Profile: Gerry Ruch

I am a sixth year graduate student working under Dr. Charles Woodward. My research involves using ideas and technologies from computer science and artificial intelligence to mine astronomical archives. My primary astronomy focus is the nature of protoplanetary disks, young stellar objects that are believed to be the birthplaces of planetary systems. I am currently developing a set of automated tools to extract the physical parameters (disk density, disk geometry, dust grain properties, etc.) of the disk sources in the Spitzer Space Telescope Cores to Disks legacy program. An extraction of these parameters from a large number of sources in a consistent way will further our understanding of the exact geometry and composition of protoplanetary disks.

Profile: Tea Temim

I am a second year graduate student working with Prof. Chick Woodward in the infrared astronomy lab. My current research involves the study of the famous Crab nebula and N49, a young supernova remnant in the LMC that is interacting with a massive dense molecular cloud. I use infrared images from the Spitzer space telescope along with images at other wavelengths to try to understand the composition, physical conditions, and the complex morphology of these supernova remnants.

Profile: Chelsea Tiffany

I'm a first year grad student. During undergrad I worked on velocity relationships in binary start systems, analyzing data for a pulsar and looking at the interaction of solar winds with the Earth's magnetic fields. I attended Wellesley College outside of Boston.

Profile: Steve Warren

I am currently working with Dr. Andrew Cole and Dr. Evan Skillman on multi-object fiber-fed echelle spectroscopic data taken with the 4.2m Herschel Telescope. I am investigating the near-infrared calcium triplet (CaT) lines of red giant stars to extend the known CaT - Metallicity relation of Galactic globular clusters to other stellar populations with larger variations of metallicities and ages. This will have a direct effect on research into Galactic and Extra-Galactic stellar populations: most notably the globular clusters of M31 (the Andromeda Galaxy) and Milky Way satellite galaxies such as the Large and Small Magellenic Clouds.

Profile: Dan Weisz

I am in my third year of graduate school working with Evan Skillman. I primarily study star formation and its role in the evolution of galaxies. Specifically, I use Hubble Space Telescope images of dwarf galaxies to reconstruct their star formation histories. Because dwarf galaxies are the building blocks of larger structures in the universe, the history of their star formation allows us to trace galaxy evolution from early proto-galaxies all the way to massive spirals. Along these lines, I am interested in both ancient star formation (e.g. the role of cosmic reionization and star formation in the early universe) and recent star formation (e.g. understanding how regions of star formation propagate throughout a galaxy).