I am an exoplanet researcher with an odd niche in the yield modeling exoplanet community. Currently I’m a NASA Postdoctoral Program Fellow (which means I’m actually an affiliate of Oak Ridge Associated Universities and not a NASA employee for some reason) at NASA Goddard working with Chris Stark on coronagraph simulations and yield modeling.
I did my PhD at Cornell University with Dmitry Savransky where I worked on EXOSIMS, the Roman Exposure Time Calculator, and how precursor RV surveys can inform scheduling future direct imaging observations. My PhD was in Aerospace engineering with a minor in Astronomy and I don’t know at if I’m an engineer in astronomy or an astronomer who knows a weird amount of controls.
In undergrad at Virginia Tech I did research with Jonathan Boreyko on out-of-plane dry zones created by droplets. Additionally, I was pooped on by a flying snake in the course of another research project. That is a true statement.