The following projects are all powered by observations of transits (exoplanets) and eclipses (binary stars): when a planet (or star) passes between us and its host star, it blocks a portion of the total light we receive from the system. By measuring the amount of light that's blocked, for how long, and how it changes over time, we can measure the physical properties of the system.

Research project topics for undergraduates and grad students are tagged with [U] or [G], respectively.

My research group analyzes a combination of ground- and space-based observations, including eclipses:

• to understand why low-mass stars appear puffier and cooler than expected. [U,G]

• to study how hot, massive stars influence the properties of cool, low-mass stars on short-period orbits -- and how many of these seemingly rare systems exist. [U,G]

• to characterize binary stars whose components are in different evolutionary stages, to "stress test" our models of stellar evolution. [U,G]

• to find and characterize new binary stars in environments very different from the Sun's: star clusters and the Milky Way's center. [U]

Many of these projects (and much of exoplanetary and stellar astronomy in general) rely on accurate measurements of a star's brightness, or flux. With the upcoming Landolt satellite, we will substantially increase the number of stars with accurate brightness measurements, and the accuracy of those measurements. Pre-launch, my research group will determine the expected achievable accuracy on physical stellar (and exoplanetary) parameters based on updated Landolt performance estimates; after launch, we will demonstrate this accuracy on selected transiting exoplanet (and binary star) systems.