My research group focuses on questions of galaxy formation and evolution addressed through “galactic archaeology” of the fossil evidence of past events left in the chemokinematical properties of resolved stellar populations. Since 2005, I have been Principal Investigator of the Apache Point Observatory Galactic Evolution Experiment (APOGEE) and its successor, APOGEE-2, which is an international … Continued
My group uses telescopes on the ground and in space to explore the formation and evolution of galaxies. Our research focuses on the physical processes that shape the baryonic content of galaxies. These include galactic winds which are believed to limit the star formation rate and disperse elements produced by stars throughout the cosmos. Understanding … Continued
My current focus is on the dynamic optical sky. The primary facility for this undertaking is the newly commissioned Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) at the Palomar Observatory. ZTF, by imaging the night sky repeatedly, is finding scores of supernovae and tens of thousands of variable stars every night. The same data allows astronomers to catalog … Continued
My primary research interest is in the detection and characterization of planets orbiting other stars, with the ultimate goal of understanding the process of planet formation generally, and the origin of the Solar System specifically.
My research group investigates a range of topics in fundamental physics, using the Universe as a laboratory to explore scales and energies that cannot be probed in any terrestrial laboratory. Our research requires tight coupling between the experimental, analytical, and theoretical disciplines. We design, build, and field experiments including balloon-borne and space-based telescopes. Our investigations … Continued
I am the lead astrophysicist in the LIGO Scientific Collaboration (LSC)–LIGO being the telescopes that first detected gravitational waves in 2015. My group’s astrophysics research involves methods from applied mathematics, statistics and computer science, with extensive use of high-performance computing. In parallel to our gravitational-wave source studies, we also study the formation and evolution of … Continued
I am an infrared spectroscopist who studies the early lives of stars and planetary systems seeking to understand pre-main sequence stellar evolution and the formation of planets. I build high-resolution infrared spectrographs. My group has also pioneered the manufacture and use of silicon immersion gratings for high resolution spectroscopy.
The research in my group is focused on determining what factors influence star formation. With recent advances in observational technology, it is now possible to characterize the physical conditions associated with modes of star formation throughout the nearby universe. We are working to understand how conditions prevalent in the universe, including interactions and mergers between … Continued
The principal focus of my group is on the theoretical aspects of cosmological probes of dark energy, dark matter, and inflation: (i) constructing new statistical techniques to extract the greatest amount of information from cosmological datasets; (ii) questioning the underlying astrophysical assumptions of observational programs, identifying previously unappreciated systematic errors, and developing techniques to correct … Continued
I am a theoretical cosmologist whose current research focus includes the use of cosmological data sets from cosmic microwave background and large scale structure surveys to understand the matter and energy contents of the universe as well as the period of cosmic acceleration in the early universe and the present.