Current Collaborations
The rich sample of young stars provided by my young associations has applications to numerous other topics in astronomy, from planetary science to galactic evolution. I am always open to new collaborative ideas, so if anything about my work interests you and you see a potential connection, feel free to contact me!
Young Planet Surveys
The SPYGLASS program's widespread identification of young stars provides an incredible resource for studying the demographics of young planetary systems. Being able to tie a planetary system to a parent association provides an age for the system, while also providing insight into the formation environment. My stellar populations are therefore invaluable for assisting surveys of young planets by indicating where young stars might be found, and characterizing all relevant stellar populations to provide insight into the planet's position within the sequence of rapid evolution within 100 Myr of formation. For this reason, I have been involved with the THYME (TESS Hunt for Young and Maturing Exoplanets) collaboration and several other projects related to the discovery and characterization of exoplanets and brown dwarfs. In a second author paper, I used my lists to identify three planets as members of a young association, which are the smallest planets ever discovered in their age bracket. I am also more loosely involved in several other papers, with my role ranging from providing input on the properties of the parent association, to confirming potential connections to an association using 3D traceback, to assisting with observing through either taking data or assisting with observing proposals.
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TESS Hunt for Young and Maturing Exoplanets (THYME). VI. An 11 Myr Giant Planet Transiting a Very-low-mass Star in Lower Centaurus Crux​
TESS Hunt for Young and Maturing Exoplanets (THYME). VII. Membership, Rotation, and Lithium in the Young Cluster Group-X and a New Young Exoplanet
TESS Hunt for Young and Maturing Exoplanets (THYME). XII. A Young Mini-Neptune on the Upper Edge of the Radius Valley in the Hyades Cluster
THYME. XIII. Two Young Neptunes Orbiting a 75 Myr Star in the Alpha Persei Cluster
TOI-4562 b: A highly eccentric temperate Jupiter analog orbiting a young field star
A benchmark companion at the hydrogen-burning limit imaged in the core cluster of the Fornax-Horologium association
Characterization of a Solar Mass Eclipsing Binary with TESS and IGRINS
New Age Work
Ages are essential for my research, as they can be combined with positions and velocities to identify where a star formation event took place. I am therefore involved in several active collaborations where I investigate ages using several different methods. Most of those projects are in preparation, but a collaborated project on asteroseismic ages in the Cep-Her complex has already been published.
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Herbig-Haro Objects
Herbig-Haro objects are features rich in Hα emission that are driven by outflows from accreting protostars. This is a brief stage in the formation of a star, and the presence of HH objects is therefore a powerful indicator of ongoing, active star formation. I published one study in collaboration with Lisa Prato (Northern Arizona University) and Travis Rector (University of Alaska-Anchorage), where I connected my study of Circinus with their information on HH objects. We found that the different morphologies and HH object contents in the two clouds in the region, Cir-E and Cir-W, may be driven by an active cloud collision currently underway between an interloping cloud and material in the feedback driven bubble in Circinus. The difference in velocities between the two colliding components in Circinus is shown in the figure below:
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I have several more projects in theis series underway, including a project studying the Serpens cloud complex, and one more targeting ρ Ophiuchi, which will serve as a companion paper to an active student project.
Simulation Work
Simulations are essential for connecting stellar populations to the cloud configurations and physical processes that led to their formation. I performed my first simulation-based analysis of a young star-forming region in my study on Circinus HERE, but I am also involved in other projects, where I draw connections between star formation simulations and the young associations in my sample.