Research Interests

I am currently working with Dr. Fred Hamann and fellow grad. student Paola Rodriguez-Hidalgo at the University of Florida to determine metallicities for high redshift quasars. Here is an abstract from a recent conference I attended in Xi'an, China:

From studies of galaxies in the local Universe we find the masses of the galactic spheroidal component corresponds with the mass of the central supermassive black hole (SMBH). This relation is known as the M(gal) - M(BH) relation, and suggests a close relationship between the formation of the galaxy and the black hole. We study the metallicities near quasars at high redshift to observe this formation process in action. Associated absorption lines (AALs) provide us with a unique tool for this study, because these lines have a high probability of forming close to the quasar. Most of the work so far, using the emission lines, suggests that quasar environments are typically metal rich, with gas-phase metallicities near solar or higher at all observed redshifts. However, other independant abundance checks, such as AALs, are essential in order to confirm these results. We use very high resolution echelle spectra from VLT-UVES for 8 high redshift (z of 2 to z of 4.6) quasars, selected to contain candidate intrinsic absorbers, and ecompassing a typical rest-frame spectral range from approximatly 900 Angstroms to 2500 Angstroms, designed to include at least Lyman alpha and C IV spectral features. We perform one of the first analyses of absorption line metallicities in high redshift quasars and present lower limits on column densities, as well as estimates for the absorber locations relative to the quasar. We place rough estimates on the abundances where possible. We find covering fractions which vary with velocity, and a significant fraction of absorption lines which exhibit variability, indicating their intrinsic nature. Saturated lines inhibit concrete abundance analysis, but present excellent opportunities for future research proposals.

Previous research projects have included working with hot spots in the solar chromosphere with Dr. Thomas Rimmele at the National Solar Observatory, a binary star search in an OB association with Dr. Chip Kobulnicky at the University of Wyoming and metallicity determinations of B-stars in nearby irregular galaxies with Dr. Kim Venn at Macalester College.