Research Projects
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I have lead the recent effort in finding an effective solution to the mass-anisotropy degeneracy that exists when analyzing line-of-sight kinematics of spheroidal galaxies. Understanding how to minimize the radial sources of mass error, in particular those due to the unknown stellar anisotropy, has allowed our group to derive very accurate masses of local group dwarf spheroidals (dSphs), thereby helping to bridge the gap in testing predictions that arise in cold dark matter simulations to observable properties of these highly dark matter dominated systems. Click here for the article.
In a related project, our SPLASH collaborators (PI: Raja Guhathakurta, Jason Kalirai, Marla Geha, among others) have recently observed and reduced the most detailed kinematic data yet for the Andromeda dSphs using Keck/DEIMOS. I am leading the mass determinations to see if a common mass scale similar to the Milky Way's dSph population exists. I had the pleasure of working under the Big Kahuna himself, Louie Strigari, Hubble Fellow and postdoc extraordinaire.
Uploaded talks and posters can be found here.
I am also continuing work on my Rutgers senior honors project with Ted Williams and Jerry Sellwood. We have improved on the model developed by Eric Barnes, Jerry Sellwood, and Adam Reese to complete an analysis on 191 H band images in the Ohio State University Bright Spiral Galaxy Survey. We hope to obtain a more objective measure of various statistical properties of galaxies, such as total bar fraction and bulge-to-disk ratio as a function of luminosity.
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