Department of Astronomy

IU Students and faculty were well-represented at the January, 2026, meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Phoenix.  Fifteen undergraduate and graduate students and three members of the faculty attended, along with many of our former students.  

Graduate student Brandon Radzom presented a dissertation talk on the origins of hot Jupiter exoplanets using his analysis of spin-orbit alignment between close in exoplanets and their host stars.  Graduate students Laurin Gray, Kristin Baker, Robert Howard, Tash Sandford, Sarah Popp, and Zohreh Safariforushani all presented posters on their research, as did undergraduate students Declan Dougan, and James Wells.  Undergraduate Robbie Mailliard presented a contributed talk on work from his summer research experience. 

Graduate students Brandon Radzom and co-authors Kristin Baker, Lexi Gault, Robert Howard, Sarah Popp, Jessica Ranshaw and Samir Salim presented a poster on the PyIU program at IU.  PyIU has provide Python training to more than 150 undergraduate (and graduate!) students from many IU departments to help them learn basic coding.  The program has expanded to serve local and regional high schools and Boys and Girls Club chapters.  PyIU is funded in part by the Indiana Space Grant Consortium. 

IU Graduate student Lexi Gault attended the meeting as an AAS Media Fellow.  In that role she authors AAS Nova posts and assists with science communication and press briefings at AAS meetings.

 

Image: 

Pictured above in the front row are Caty Pilachowski, Brandon Radzom, Kristin Baker, Lexi Gault, and Kathy Rhode.  In the back row are Zohreh Safariforushani, Robert Howard, James Wells, Jennifer Sieben (Ph.D. 2022), Tash Sandford, Robbie Mailliard, Sarah Popp, Laurin Gray, and John Salzer.  Not pictured: Declan Dougan, Bradley Hutchinson.