Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

The Disk Structure Of Late Type Galaxies: Determining The Black Hole Mass Function Of Low Surface Brightness Galaxies Through Logarithmic Spiral Arm Pitch Angle Measurement, Michael S. Fusco

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation pertains to the geometric structure of late type (spiral) galaxies, specifically on the relation between the logarithmic spiral pitch angle of the galactic spiral arms with other properties of the galaxy, such as central Supermassive Black Hole (SMBH) mass. Our work continues a study of the Black Hole Mass Function (BHMF) in local galaxies by recording the pitch angles of spiral galaxies with lower surface brightness than were previously included. We also conduct a case study on the structure of an interestingly shaped galaxy, UGC 4599. Previous studies on the topic of spiral arm pitch angles have measured …

Measuring Deterministic And Stochastic Gravitational Waves With Pulsar Timing Array Experiments, Kristina Islo

Theses and Dissertations

Pulsar timing arrays (PTAs) are uniquely poised to detect the nanohertz-frequency gravitational waves from supermassive black hole binaries (SMBHBs) formed during galaxy merger. Efforts are underway to observe three species of gravitational signal from these systems: the stochastic ensemble, individual, adiabatic binary inspirals, and bursts with memory. This dissertation discusses all three.

A typical Bayesian search for evidence of a stochastic gravitational wave background from the superposition of many unresolvable SMBHB inspirals requires weeks to months to deliver results. This is due in part to the inclusion of inter-pulsar spatial and temporal correlations induced in PTA data by such a …

Thornado-Hydro: Generalizing Discontinuous Galerkin Methods For A Nuclear Equation Of State For Supernova Hydrodynamics, Brandon Lynn Barker, Eirik Endeve, Anthony Mezzacappa

Chancellor’s Honors Program Projects

No abstract provided.

The Invisible Sun: Building A Radio Interferometer Telescope, Isobel Curtin

Senior Projects Spring 2019

When we think of astronomy, we often associate the word implicitly with observing astronomical bodies with our own eyes, or from a signal collected in the visible light range. However, there is more information we can collect from these bodies when observing them using other kinds of light, unseen to the naked eye. Radio astronomy is an important tool in an astronomer’s toolkit, and can help us image hidden parts of the universe. Recently, radio astronomy was used to directly image a black hole in the center of a nearby galaxy for the first time!

This projects aims to further …