Welcome

Hi! I'm Aimee, an astrophysicist and PhD candidate at CU Boulder.

I am interested in the role galaxy mergers play in galaxy evolution through cosmic time.

I am broadly interested in galaxy evolution, particularly around cosmic noon. I have focused on studying galaxy mergers throughout my PhD with cosmological simulations and machine learning.

Research

Here are some of the key projects I've been working on during my PhD:

  • Toward Complete Merger Identification at High Redshifts with Deep Learning : I use CNNs to identify galaxy mergers. I am particularly interested in how we can use CNNs to find mergers beyond obvious, major mergers of spiral galaxies. This is key to understanding the role of mergers at cosmic noon, as many galaxies don't yet look like galaxies in our local universe. I also want to build trust in these models by relating their outputs to astrophysical properties.
  • Enhanced Star Formation and Black Hole Accretion Rates in Galaxy Mergers in IllustrisTNG50: I collaborated with astronomers at the CCA to investigate how mergers behave differently from nonmergers in IllustrisTNG50. We found mergers tended to have both excess sSFR and sBHAR.
six panel figure depicting different galaxy merger stages
Stages of a galaxy merger. Credit: NASA, ESA, the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)-ESA/Hubble Collaboration and A. Evans (University of Virginia, Charlottesville/NRAO/Stony Brook University), K. Noll (STScI), and J. Westphal (Caltech).