Vanderbilt Astronomy: Research

Berlind's research interests lie in the areas of large-scale structure and galaxy formation. He works in the interface between theory and observation, comparing simulations of structure formation to observations of galaxy clustering from large surveys. Since 2002, he has been an active member of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey.

Kelly Holley-Bockelmann is an Assistant Professor of Physics and Astronomy at Vanderbilt.

Holley-Bockelmann works on galaxy formation using N-body simulations.

Stellar Astronomy

C. R. O'Dell is a Distinguished Research Professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at Vanderbilt University. From 1972 to 1983 O'Dell was the Project Scientist for the Hubble Space Telescope, which he now uses in his research. Professor O'Dell is also the Andrew Hayes Buchanan Emeritus Professor of Astrophysics, Rice University.

Presently, O'Dell's research interests include star formation in the Orion Nebula Cluster and the structure and evolution of Planetary Nebulae. His most recent publications have been focused on proplyd-like features, outflows in the Orion-South region, and knots in the Helix Nebula. The overarching goals of this recent work are to characterize the physical conditions of the environs in which these features are found and to explain how they arise. O'Dell has written a book, The Orion Nebula: Where Stars are Born, where he tells us all about his long-time research target, the young Orion Nebula Cluster.

Keivan Stassun is an Associate Professor of Physics and Astronomy at Vanderbilt; he also holds the position of Adjunct Assistant Professor of Astronomy in the Department of Physics at Fisk University. He was recently awarded the 2007 Chancellor's award for Research. Stassun is also very involved in many diversity and outreach initiatives, his diversity page is located here.

Stassun's research interests include stellar evolution, planet formation, X-ray production in young stars, and mechanisms by which stars lose angular momentum during the evolution process. More recently, he has been looking at increasing the number of pre-main sequence stars and brown dwarfs with empirically determined masses, which will lead to a better understanding of the star-formation scenario. He has also been studying the origins of magnetic activity and time correlated variation in young stars using simulataneous optical and x-ray variability.

David A. Weintraub is a Professor of Astronomy at Vanderbilt University. He also is the current Director of Undergraduate Studies and Director of the Program in Communication of Science and Technology. Vanderbilt University awarded Prof. Weintraub was awarded with the Jeffrey Nordhaus Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching in 2003 and the Chancellor's Award for Research in 2005.

Weintraub's primary research interest is in star and planet formation. He has specialized in the use of polarization imaging to learn about the dust in circumstellar environments. His recent work focuses on detecting and studying molecular gas in the environments of young stars. Recently, Weintraub wrote Is Pluto a Planet ?, exploring the definition of the word "planet."

Planetary Astronomy

Rick Chappell is a Research Professor of Physics and the Executive Director of Dyer Observatory. He joined Vanderbilt in 1997 after a distinguished 23-year career in NASA, where he was the Chief Scientist of the NASA / Marshall Space Flight Center in his last 10 years with NASA. He was also the Mission Scientist for the Spacelab-I Mission (1976-1985) and was trained Alternate Payload Specialist for the ATLAS-1 mission of the space shuttle (1985-1992).

Rick Chappell is involved in the study of how the Earth fills its magnetic envelope, the magnetosphere, with plasma that comes from the ionosphere and from the solar wind. For many years, the solar wind was thought to be the dominant source of magnetospheric plasma. Now it appears that the Earth's ionosphere may well be the dominant source. Chappell analyzes data from the Thermal Ion Dynamics Experiment (TIDE), a time of flight ion mass spectrometer on the NASA Polar spacecraft.

Josh Pepper is a VIDA post-doctoral fellow in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at Vanderbilt. He received his A. B. in Astrophysical Sciences from Princeton University in 2000 and received his Ph. D. in Astronomy from The Ohio State University in 2007.

His primary research interests focus on the search for extrasolar planets. He has has worked on the theory of searching for exoplanets with transits surveys, and he built and operated the KELT telescope at Winer Observatory to search for planets. He is currently building a Southern KELT telescope for Vanderbilt to be located at Sutherland, South Africa, to be operated jointly by Vanderbilt and the South African Astronomical Observatory. Through his work on transit surveys, Pepper has also worked on studies of open clusters and variable stars, especially eclipsing binaries.