News
2024
Jun: Welcome to two NSF REU students: Jake Ridenbaugh and Lucy Howell!
Apr: Dominique Segura-Cox accepts a tenure-track faculty position at the University of Rochester. Congrats, Dom!!
Apr: Prof. Offner receives the 2024 Peter O'Donnell Distinguished Researcher Award from the Oden Institute.
Feb: Prof. Offner gives the McDonald Observatory Great Lecture!
Jan: Congrats to Cheng-Han Hsieh, who will join the UT Austin Star formation group as a Hubble Postdoctoral Fellow fall 2024!
2023
May: Welcome to REU scholar Andrew Milne!
May: Prof. Offner awarded a Moncrief Grand Challenge Award by Oden Institute!
Apr: Congrats to Dominque Segura-Cox on winning best poster at Protostars & Planets VII.
2022
Nov: Prof. Offner & Josh Taylor awarded a Machine Learning Laboratory grant to work on unsupervised machine learning methods.
Oct: Prof. Offner awarded a NASA ADAP to use machine learning to study infrared observations of stars, galaxies.
Aug: Articles and press-releases related to Guszejnov et al. 2022: "UT-Austin researchers find the answer to how stars form" in the The Daily Texan. Center for astrophysics news "New Study Sheds Light on Why Stellar Populations are so Similar in the Milky Way."
Aug: Prof. Offner had a wonderful visit at ANU as a Distinguished Stromlo Visitor.
Jun: Welcome to TAURUS and REU Scholars Cayden Kirkpatrick, Cosme Aquino Ovelar and Sammy Sharief!
Apr: Congrats to Aman Raju for being named a Dean's Honored Graduate!
Apr: Congrats to Nina Filippova, who was awarded a DOE Computational Science Graduate Fellowship!
Mar: Prof. Offner receives NCU-Delta Young Astronomer Lectureship award!
Feb: NASA Hubble Postdoctoral Fellowship awarded to David Guszejnov! Congrats!
2021
Dec: Welcome to postdoc Juan Farias!
Oct: Welcome to NSF A&A postdoc fellow Dominique Segura-Cox!
Oct: Congrats to A. Lue on the publication of her RNAAS studying the gas density distribution in STARFORGE calculations.
Sept: Welcome to postdoc Josh Taylor!
July: Congrats to A. Raju on the publication of his RNAAS on the stellar multiplicity of STARFORGE calculations.
July: David Guszejnov awarded a Cottrell Postdoctoral Fellowship!
July: Congratulations to Duo Xu on his sucessful PhD Defense!! Now onward to a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Virginia!
June: Offner awarded NSF AAG to develop unsupervised machine learning techniques for astronomy data.
June: Welcome to summer researchers Amanda Lue (Colgate) and Carleen Markey (Perdue)!
May: STARFORGE featured on Phys.org, CNN among many others!
May: Margot Fitz Axen paper on the "Transport of Protostellar Cosmic Rays in Turbulent Dense Cores" is accepted to ApJ (arxiv)!
May: STARFORGE method paper is accepted to MNRAS ( arXiv).
Apr: First STARFORGE paper modelling the formation of star clusters with protostellar jets is published in MNRAS (arXiv). Visit the STARFORGE website for movies!
2020
Dec: Xu paper on "Application of Convolutional Neural Networks to Identify Protostellar Outflows in CO Emission" is published in ApJ (ADS). CASI-3D software is available on gitlab.
Sept: Congrats to summer researcher C. Markey on the publication of her RNAAS analyzing the origin of mass segregation in star clusters!
July: Press release on the origin of radioactive aluminum in the early solar system (ADS). This work is also featured in Sky & Telescope.
June: Guszejnov paper that asks "Can magnetized turbulence set the mass scale of stars?" and answers "no" is accepted to MNRAS (ADS).
May: Congratulations to D. Karkada for being awarded a UT Austin Endowed Presidential Scholarship, which recognizes excellence in academics and research and is only awarded to a few students in the university each year!
Apr: Congratulations to M. Fitz Axen for being awarded a 4-year DOE Computational Graduate Fellowship!
Apr: Offner forms a new star (Lily) and welcomes her to the Universe.
Jan: E. Piperno's research note "Comparing Methods to Identify GMCs in Simulated Galaxies" completed and accepted. ADS
2019
Dec: Guszejnov paper on "Evolution of giant molecular clouds across cosmic time" accepted to MNRAS (ADS).
Nov: Offner awarded NASA ATP grant to study the impact of low-energy cosmic-ray feedback on star formation.
Nov: A. Lee's paper on binary formation "The Formation and Evolution of Wide-Orbit Stellar Multiples In Magnetized Clouds" accepted to ApJ! Astro-ph.
Sept: Offner awarded UT Austin CNS Excellence in Teaching Award!
Aug: Welcome to new group member Margot Fitz-Axen!
Aug: Gaches (+ Offner & Bisbas) paper on "The Astrochemical Impact of Cosmic Rays in Protoclusters II: CI-to-H$ and CO-to-H2 Conversion Factors" is accepted to ApJ (astro-ph)! Offner's paper with Gaches and Holdship on the" Impact of Cosmic-Ray Feedback on Accretion and Chemistry in Circumstellar Disks" is accepted to ApJ (astro-ph)!
Apr: Welcome to new group member Enrico Piperno!
Mar: Offner is quoted in a Forbes article about star formation.
Mar: Congratulations to post-doc Aaron Lee - who accepted a faculty position at St. Mary's in CA, to begin in August!
Feb: Congratulations to Brandt Gaches - who accepted a post-doctoral position at the University of Cologne, to begin in August!
2018
Oct: Former undergraduate researcher, Joyce Lee, wins Southampton Theory Astrophysics and Gravity (STAG) prize for best paper in last 4 years for Lee, Hull & Offner 2017! The prize is bestowed by the Dean at Southampton University at a lecture by Noel Prize Laureate Rainer Weiss.
Sept: Offner & Liu paper on stellar "action at a distance" published in Nature Astronomy: "Turbulent action at a distance due to stellar feedback in magnetized clouds." Nature Article. Behind the Paper blog post. Press Release. Simulation movie.
Aug: Post-docs David Guszejnov and Hope Chen join the star formation group!
May: Offner awarded NSF Astronomy & Astrophysics grant to use machine learning to study stellar feedback.
May: Gaches & Offner's predictions on cosmic ray fluxes accepted to ApJ: "Exploration of Cosmic Ray Acceleration in Protostellar Accretion Shocks and A Model for Ionization Rates in Embedded Protoclusters." Astro-ph. Online cosmic-ray calculator.
May: Boyden's astronomy senior thesis is accepted for publication in ApJ "Assessing the Impact of Astrochemistry on Molecular Cloud Turbulence Statistics." Astro-ph.
Feb: Call opens for machine learning in astronomy submissions in Springer special issue
Feb: Offner gives Astronomy On Tap at the NorthDoor
Feb: Offner named a Cottrell Scholar. UT Austin press-release.
Jan: Gaches & Offner's paper "A Model for Protostellar Cluster Luminosities and the Impact on the CO-H_2 Conversion Factor " accepted to ApJ. Astro-ph
2017
Dec: Xu awarded a Frank N. Edmonds, Jr. Memorial Fellowship in Astronomy
Nov: Xu and Offner's paper "Assessing the Performance of a Machine Learning Algorithm in Identifying Bubbles in Dust Emission" is accepted to ApJ. Astro-ph.
Sept: Offner interviewed for an article in the The Daily Texan on simulating stars.
Sept: Offner & Chaban's paper "Impact of Protostellar Outflows on Turbulence and Star Formation Efficiency in Magnetized Dense Cores" accepted to ApJ. Astro-ph.
Aug: The Star Formation Group has moved! Find us at the University of Texas at Austin
June: Greenbank Ammonia Survey results featured in Science Daily and ANSA. GBT Press Release.
May: Boyden awarded 21st Century Leadership Award
March: Gaches and Xu awarded Mary Daily Irvine travel grant to present at EWASS conference
March: Offner awarded 5-year NSF CAREER grant
2016
Dec: Boyden's paper on "An Exploration of the Statistical Signatures of Stellar Feedback" published in ApJ
Aug: "Turbulent Origin of Outflow and Spin Misalignment" featured in Nova press release
Aug: Offner's paper on "Turbulent Origin of Outflow and Spin Misalignment in Binary Systems" published in ApJ
May: Chaban awarded David J. van Blerkom Research Scholarship
March: Offner profiled in Authorea blog
2015
Nov: Offner presents public talk on binary stars at the American Museum of Natural History
May: Boyden awarded David J. van Blerkom Research Scholarship
Feb: Multiple Stellar System Discovery featured in Space.com, Washington Post, Australian Broadcase Corporation, Japan Times, Science World Report
Feb: "Wide Separation Multiple Stellar System" featured in Nature News & Views
Feb: New discovery of "A Wide Separation Multiple Stellar System Caught in Formation" published in Nature. Press release.