Ilaria Pascucci, Professor, Department of Planetary Sciences and Astronomy.
I am interested in understanding the origin and diversity of planetary systems. I am leading multiple studies to characterize protoplanetary disks, how they evolve and disperse, and which of their properties mostly impact the planets that form within. To this end I have used a number of techniques (spectroscopy, spectroastromery, imaging) and observations at multiple wavelengths.
Naman Bajaj, Graduate student. Naman is studying how planet-forming disks evolve and disperse. He is using MIRI and NIRSpec JWST IFU imaging and spectroscopy to identify and characterize disk winds around young stars.
Sophie Clark, Graduate student. Sophie is focusing on understanding which physical mechanisms drive the evolution of protoplanetary disks. She is currently using magnetohydrodynamic wind models coupled with radiative transfer to match observations of winds obtained at multiple wavelengths and constrain the rate at which disk mass is lost via winds.
Dingshan Deng, Graduate student. Dingshan is studying the birth sites of planets, particularly using the Atacama Large Millimeter Array. He is currently focusing on developing an approach to accurately estimate gas disk masses. Visit Dingshan’s website for more info.
Kiki Gonglewski, Graduate student. Kiki is interested in understanding how planets form around other stars. She is currently working on exoplanet demographics using K2 data and contributing to the development of a comprehensive tool for analyzing integrated exoplanet demographics across multiple missions.
Chengyan Xie, Graduate student. Chengyan’s research focuses on connecting the properties of circumstellar disks to forming planets. He is currently analyzing the infrared variability of a disk with a large cavity likely carved by one or more planets.
Former postdocs and graduate students:
University of Arizona/LPL:
- Galen Bergsten, graduate student, now Exoplanet fellow at the STScI
- Feng Long, NASA Sagan Postdoctoral Fellow, now faculty at Peking University
- Rachel Fernandes, graduate student, now President’s Postdoctoral Fellow at Penn State
- Kamber Schwarz, NASA Sagan Postdoctoral Fellow, now at the MPIA
- Nathan Hendler, graduate student, now postdoc at UofA
- Andrea Banzatti, postdoc, now faculty at Texas State
- Min Fang, postdoc, now faculty at the Purple Mountain Observatory
- Gijs Mulders, postdoc, now faculty at the University of Adolfo Ibáñez
- Molly Simon, graduate student, now Assistant Professor at ASU
- Elisabetta Rigliaco, postdoc, now a Marie Curie Fellow at the Observatory of Padova
- James Keane, graduate, now planetary scientist at JPL
Space Telescope & Johns Hopkins University:
- Davide Fedele, postdoc, now Research Staff at the Arcetri Observatory in Italy
- Veronica Roccatagliata, postdoc, now a Marie Curie Fellow at the Arcetri Observatory, Florence
- Basmah Riaz, postdoc, now at the University of Munich