Group

Astroweiss Group

The astroweiss group includes postdoctoral scholars, graduate students, and undergraduate students who are studying diverse topics related to exoplanet system architectures and planetary compositions and formation.  Group members are currently supported at two sites: University of Notre Dame and University of Hawaii, Manoa.

Astroweiss Group, 2023 (Notre Dame)

L to R: Lauren Weiss, Matthias He, Aaron Householder,  Alex Thomas, Jared Kolecki, Carlos Jurado, Matthew Doty, David Shaw.  Not pictured: Casey Brinkman, Jingwen Zhang.

Astroweiss Group, 2021 (U. Hawaii)

L to R: Dan Huber, Jingwen Zhang, Lauren Weiss, Casey Brinkman.

Postdoctoral Scholars

Dr. Matthias Yang He (2022-), Notre Dame

Determining the Most Common Planetary System Architectures

Graduate Students

Jared Kolecki (2023-), Notre Dame

Elemental Abundances of Planet-Hosting Stars

C. Alex Thomas (2022-), Notre Dame

A Tale of Two Peas in a Pod: Mass Uniformity in the Kepler-323 and Kepler-104 systems

David Shaw (2022-), Notre Dame

Masses and orbits in Kepler's Highest Multiplicity System from RVs and TTVs

Casey Brinkman (2019-), U. Hawaii, PhD candidate

PhD Thesis: What is the diversity of rocky planet compositions and their connection to host star abundances?

Jingwen Zhang (2019-), U. Hawaii

PhD Thesis: Dynamical Architectures of Planets in S-Type Binary Star Systems from Radial Velocities, Astrometry, Direct Imaging, and Transits

Jack Lubin (2020-2022), UC Irvine

TESS-Keck Survey V: Masses of Three Sub-Neptunes Orbiting HD 191939 and the Discovery of Two Outer Jovians (published in The Astronomical Journal)

Emma Turtelboom (2020-2022), UC Berkeley

TESS-Keck Survey XI: Mass diversity in four similarly sized sub-Neptunes (published in The Astronomical Journal)

Sarah Blunt (2018-2019) , Caltech

Radial Velocity Discovery of an Eccentric Jovian World Orbiting at 18 AU (published in The Astronomical Journal)

Undergraduate Students

Carlos Jurado (2023-), Notre Dame REU

Upper Limits on Companions to Kepler's Circumbinary Planets from a Decade of RVs

Matthew Doty (2023-), Notre Dame

Orbital Stability of High-Multiplicity Planetary Systems with Various Architectures

Aaron Householder (2022-2023), Notre Dame REU

Mass and radius diversity of the sub-Neptune sized planets in Kepler-105 revealed through RVs and TTVs, The Inconsistent Use of Angles in the RV Equation (manuscript available here)

Andrew Langford (2021-2023), Notre Dame

A Dynamical Systems Approach to the Theory of Circumbinary Orbits in the Circular Restricted Problem (published in The Astronomical Journal)

Thomas Vandal (2018), U. Montreal

Masses and Orbits of the Beta Pictoris Planets

Merrin Peterson (2017), U. Montreal

Upper limits on spectral features from water in 51 Pegasi b from archival Keck-HIRES spectra (summer project)

Laura Daclison (2018), Waipahu High School

Maunakea Scholars Program: Properties of the Kepler Circumbinary Systems from Keck Observations

Keck Planet Hunter Collaboration

My extended research group includes investigators from various universities who are using the W. M. Keck Observatory to discover and characterize exoplanets and their host stars with high-resolution spectroscopy.  Group activities include frequent observing on Keck, observer training, data management, and of course, analysis of the planets and stars that are so dear to us!

Keck Planet Hunters, 2019

Back row, L to R: Howard Isaacson, Sean Mills, Lee Rosenthal, Erik Petigura, Andrew Howard, Dan Huber, BJ Fulton.   Front row, L to R: Lauren Weiss, Lea Hirsch, Ryan Rubenzahl, Molly Kosiarek, Aida Behmard, Sam Grunblatt

Resources

Are you interested in joining our group?  Check out our student-advisor research contract!

Student-Advisor Research Contract

grad_student_contract.pdf

Previous Group Photos

Astroweiss Group, 2022

L to R: Andrew Langford, Matthias He, Alex Thomas, Lauren Weiss, Aaron Householder, Casey Brinkman, David Shaw.