Hi, I am Archana Soam, Associate Professor at Indian Institute of Astrophysics, Bangalore

My research interests include the investigations of magnetic fields in various environments such as low- and intermediate-mass star forming regions on their different evolutionary stages, Bright-rimmed clouds (BRCs) in several HII regions, and filamentary dark clouds using optical/near- far-IR/ sub(mm) polarimetry. I also work on understanding the radiatively-driven kinematics of molecular clouds located on peripheries of these HII regions. So far, I have covered optical, near- and far-infrared polarization regimes. I am now mostly working on gas kinematics and physical properties of these regions using multi-band molecular gas tracer observations specially from Taeduk Radio Astronomical Observatory (TRAO) and Green Bank Telescope (GBT). I mainly use data from Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA), James Clerk Maxwell Telescope (JCMT), Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), and Planck for my research projects. I am also investigating/testing the ISM dust grain alignment theories using polarization measurements.

 Research Areas:

• Molecular hydrogen formation and heat transfer to the surface of dust grains in interstellar medium (ISM).

• Radiative grain alignment in photo-dissociation regions (PDRs) and isolated star-forming molecular clouds. 

• Investigation on kinematics of PDRs using [CII] observations. 

• Magnetized evolution of triggered star forming regions i.e. bright-rimmed clouds (BRCs) in HII regions

• Investigation of radiation driven implosion (RDI) in BRCs in HII regions using molecular line observations.

• Physics and evolution of ISM- Formation of molecular clouds (starless/prestellar protostellar cores) and subsequent star formation in context of magnetic fields.

• Early phases of galactic low mass star formation - Investigation on Very Low Luminosity Objects (VeLLOs) and proto-brown dwarf candidates.

• Constraining the magnetically dominated star formation models through optical, near-IR, FIR and sub(mm) polarization measurements.

Work Experience:

Jan 2026- Present

Indian Institute of Astrophysics, Bangalore

Associate Professor

Dec. 2021 - Dec. 2015

Indian Institute of Astrophysics, Bangalore

Assistant Professor

July. 2018 - Nov. 2021

SOFIA Science center, NASA Ames research Center, CA, USA

NSF postdoctoral fellow

Korea Astronomy & Space Science Institute (KASI), South Korea

KASI postdoctoral fellow

ARIES, India

Ph.D., Astronomy