RESEARCH | ktirimba

MASTER PROJECTS

THE SEARCH FOR HOT JUPITERS AROUND BRIGHT STARS

The likes of Kepler and TESS have revolutionized the field of

Exoplanet science with the discovery of thousands of planets

via the transit method. The Multi-site All-Sky CAmeRA (MASCARA)

and TESS provide a synergy for the brightest host stars with

TESS' more sensitive instruments being coupled with

MASCARA's multi-year data for the observed stars.

MAPPING THE STRUCTURE OF THE MILKY WAY USING MASERS

The structure of the Milky Way has long been a topic of contention

due to the observational limitations owed to our position within its

disk. In particular, the positions of its spiral arms has been difficult

to pinpoint due to copious amounts of extinction obscuring our view.

Initial successes in mapping this structure came from OB associations/

and HI 21cm radio observations.

High mass star forming regions (HMSFRs) have since become

the primary beacon in tracing the spiral structure of the Galaxy.

This is due to the environments necessary for their formation,

particularly the large dense molecular clouds that only collapse as

a result of the gravitational perturbations and streaming instabilities

that form the spiral arms.
Their use as tracers of the spiral structure has proven successful

in constraining the widths and pitch angles of the arms in addition to

constraining key Galactic parameters such as the sun's distance from

the Galactic center, its velocity around the Galactic center, and the

rotation curve of the Galaxy. Maser emission has been associated with

HMSFRs, and therefore, has been widely used to study these environments.

UNDERGRAD RESEARCH

THE SEARCH FOR LOW METALLICITY DWARF GALAXIES

Low metallicity galaxies in the local universe provide a window to an

early universe devoid of the metals. Probing these regions yields dependable

estimates of the primordial abundances of Hydrogen, Helium and trace elements

that have big implications in Big Bang Nucleosynthesis.