Time Domain Astronomy

The Universe is a dynamic, changing, vibrant entity. Modern surveys, especially those by the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) and the upcoming Vera Rubin Observatory’s Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) promise to deliver unprecedented data volumes of light curves of everything from pulsating stars to extragalactic transients. Professor Smith uses these data sets to study the turbulence, dynamics, and periodicities of accretion disks around supermassive black holes and the high-energy astrophysics of relativistic jets. [pdb_list template=custom display_count=”false” sort=”false” orderby=last_name order=asc filter=”approved=yes&job_category=faculty&interests~tda”]