Research Group

Dr. Judah Van Zandt
Postdoctoral Researcher (UCSB)
Judah combines observational techniques to measure planetary occurrence rates. He uses the shapes of these occurrence rate distributions to infer the physical processes governing planet formation across a wide range of companion masses and separations.

Dr. Rocio Kiman
Postdoctoral Researcher (UCSB)
Rocio Kiman works at the intersection of giant exoplanets, brown dwarfs, and stars. She develops methods to estimate precise fundamental stellar parameters and uses these advancements, combined with forward-modeling analysis, to study planetary atmosphere composition. She is also interested in estimating stellar ages to study planetary migration and occurrence rates as a function of time. By combining these approaches, she aims to understand the formation of giant planets.

Marvin Morgan
Graduate Student (UT)
Marvin is using the underlying eccentricity distribution of warm Jupiters to understand their past migration and current orbital architectures. The goal of this program is to establish the relative importance of various possible migration channels. His previous work considered how the timing of the giant planet instability was impacted in the early solar system.

Lillian Jiang
Graduate Student (UT)
Lillian's research focuses on the formation of exoplanets and sub-stellar objects using high-contrast imaging and multi-wavelength spectra. Her current project involves identifying accreting protoplanets in star-forming regions to clarify their formation mechanisms and to constrain the occurrence rate of massive giant planets at wide separations.

Claire Finley
Graduate Student (UT)
Claire is working to jointly constrain accretion rates and disk properties of wide planets. She is utilizing imaging from the UV to the mid-infrared to characterize these planets and their disks.

Postdocs:
Lauren Biddle (Postdoctoral Researcher -> Henry Norris Russel Fellow at Princeton)
Yifan Zhou (McDonald Fellow -> 51 Peg b Fellow -> Faculty at UVA)
Zhoujian Zhang (Postdoc Researcher -> Hubble Fellow at UCSC -> Faculty at the University of Rochester)
Ya-Lin Wu (51 Peg b Fellow -> Faculty at National Taiwan Normal University)

Graduate Students:
Kyle Franson (UT Austin GS -> NASA Sagan Fellow at UCSC)
Katie Painter (UT Austin GS) Quang Tran (UT Austin GS -> 51 Peg b Fellow at Yale)
Trevor Wolf (Aerospace Engineering; co-advisor for portion of dissertation)
Caprice Phillips (UT Austin GS -> GS at OSU)

Undergraduates:
Rebeca Soto (ASU GS)
Aniket Sanghi (UT Austin UG -> GS at Caltech)
Sarah Howes (UT Austin UG -> GS at Leiden U)
Kailee Turner (UT Austin UG)
Katelyn Ashok (UT Austin UG)
Christina Negrete-Montero (UT Austin UG)
Itzel Montero (UT Austin UG)
Pranav Premnath (UT Austin UG -> SETI -> GS at UCI)
Aldo Sepulveda (UT San Antonio UG -> GS at UH/IfA)
Justin Yudichak (UT Austin UG -> UT Applied Research Laboratories)
Viyang Shah (UT Austin UG)
Analis Lawrence (TAURUS scholar; FIU -> GS at UF)
Isaiah Tristan (TAURUS scholar; Rice U -> GS at CU)