Graduate Students

Meet the team

The 2017 Noche de las Estrellas pilot saw the MESA Schools Program and the James Lick Observatory take graduate students to the four different school sites to have an interactive optics demonstration with students. We hope to share the basics of telescopes with students so that there can be a fluid discussion and presentations at the Observatory.

Name: Asher D. Wasserman, Graduate Team Leader

Field of Study: I study the star cluster systems of nearby galaxies to learn about their evolutionary history and their dark matter content.

Why did you decide to work in STEM: I had some fantastic teachers in high school who encouraged me to pursue a career in science.

Fun Fact: I've been learning to play the electric bass! And my favorite thing to do in Santa Cruz is getting lost in the woods in Henry Cowell State Park.

Ariadna Murguia

Name: Matthew Siebert

Field of Study: Transient Astronomy (exploding stars)

Why did you decide to work in STEM: Working in STEM often requires creative problem solving which is something I find very rewarding

Fun Fact: Favorite sport is disc golf

Brittany Miles

Name: Felipe Ardila

Field of Study: Extragalactic astronomy

Why did you decided to work in STEM: My parents are both scientists and growing up I was exposed to a lot of scientific experiments and concepts. I fell in love with astronomy when my grandfather would show me the moon, planets and constellations from his farm in Colombia.

Fun Fact: I used to DJ in college!

Name: César Rojas Bravo

Field of Study: Transient Astronomy: mainly SN Ia cosmology and kilonovae

Why did you decide to work in STEM: Cesar has always been curious about how things work. He was always math-inclined, but it was during high school when he grabbed a Physics textbook and was completely fascinated about the explanations of how Nature works. Afterwards, Cesar wanted to study the Universe, something so vast and mysterious, and decided to go into Astrophysics research (there is no undergrad in Astrophysics in Costa Rica), and gladly, here he is!

Fun Fact: Besides having an undergraduate degree in Physics, Cesar also majored in Classical Studies (the study of Ancient Greece and Rome through its language, literature and history): it's another passion of his.

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