Curriculum Vitae
I've been fortunate enough to have performed undergraduate astronomy for about 3 years now. It has been an extremely enriching experience for me. Feel free to look over my CV listed on this page. A PDF copy of my CV is available here or upon request!
Worked in the Geller group at Northwestern University to determine the period-recovery capabilities of the new Vera Rubin Observatory. Compiled survey data of ~2,000 open and globular clusters. Used these data to evolve binary populations for each cluster to representative age. Binaries with periods longer than the hard-soft boundary of the cluster (determined via cluster data) were not considered. Then generated and fit light curves for each binary. Determined binary period from folded light curves with a Lomb-Scargle algorithm. Used this method to compare various observing strategies for the Vera Rubin Observatory to determine optimal cadence for viewing eclipsing binary stars. Presented this work to the Northwestern Physics and Astronomy department as well as to the general public at the Adler Planetarium. I attended the 2019 LSSTC Project Community Workshop and gave a poster presentation of this work as part of the undergraduate cohort. Presented research poster of this work at the 235th meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Honolulu, HI. This work is currently in preparation for a publication that will be released in mid-2020.
Attempted to determine period recovery rate of LSST for galactic field binaries. Utilized same strategy as that of our cluster binary analysis, without the consideration of intra-cluster dynamics for galactic field binaries. Also generated updated limb-darkening coefficients for new LSST filter system. Without this, the telescope would be using an outdated filter system that could render it less efficient in observing eclipsing binary stars. Our method of recovering binary periods was in agreement with previous studies. This was presented in a poster to the Northwestern Physics and Astronomy department as well as the general public at the Adler planetarium.