Blakesley Burkhart is an astrophysicist. She is the winner of the 2017 Robert J. Trumpler Award awarded by the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, which recognizes a Ph.D. thesis that is "particularly significant to astronomy." She also is the winner of the 2019 Annie Jump Cannon Award in Astronomy and the 2022 winner of The American Physical Society's Maria Goeppert-Mayer Award. The awards both cited her work on magnetohydrodynamic turbulence, and for developing innovative techniques for comparing observable astronomical phenomena with theoretical models.[1]
Blakesley Burkhart | |
|---|---|
| Alma mater | University of Wisconsin–Madison |
| Known for | Magnetohydrodynamics research |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Astrophysics |
| Thesis | New frontiers for diagnosing the turbulent nature of the multiphase magnetized interstellar medium (2014) |
| Doctoral advisor | Alex Lazarian |
| Website | www |
Career
editBurkhart completed her Ph.D. in astronomy at the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 2014. Her dissertation explores "connections between theoretical, numerical, and observational understanding of [magnetohydrodynamic turbulence] as it applies to the neutral, ionized, and molecular interstellar medium."[2] She was a post-doctoral fellow at the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian. She has made contributions to many other fields outside of plasma turbulence, including star formation, the intergalactic medium, globular cluster formation, and UV space telescope design.[3] She worked with Mark R. Krumholz and others to develop a unified model of disc galaxies, working to explain why disc galaxies have a lower rate of star formation than is predicted by other models.[4][5] In August 2018, she became an associate research scientist at the Flatiron Institute's Center for Computational Astrophysics. She has been working as an assistant professor at Rutgers University in the department of Physics and Astronomy since September 2019.[6]
She was the host of the 5 Minute Astronomy podcast from 89.9FM WORT in Madison.[7]
Selected publications
edit- Burkhart, Blakesley; Falceta-Gonçalves, D.; Kowal, G.; Lazarian, A. (2009-03-01). "Density Studies of MHD Interstellar Turbulence: Statistical Moments, Correlations and Bispectrum". The Astrophysical Journal. 693 (1): 250–266. arXiv:0811.0822. Bibcode:2009ApJ...693..250B. doi:10.1088/0004-637X/693/1/250. ISSN 0004-637X. S2CID 15997930.
- Gaensler, B. M.; Haverkorn, M.; Burkhart, B.; Newton–McGee, K. J.; Ekers, R. D.; Lazarian, A.; McClure–Griffiths, N. M.; Robishaw, T.; Dickey, J. M. (2011-10-05). "Low-Mach-number turbulence in interstellar gas revealed by radio polarization gradients". Nature. 478 (7368): 214–217. arXiv:1110.2896. Bibcode:2011Natur.478..214G. doi:10.1038/nature10446. hdl:2066/92017. ISSN 0028-0836. PMID 21976022. S2CID 1472898.
- Burkhart, Blakesley; Stanimirović, Snežana; Lazarian, A.; Kowal, Grzegorz (2010-01-10). "Characterizing Magnetohydrodynamic Turbulence in the Small Magellanic Cloud". The Astrophysical Journal. 708 (2): 1204–1220. arXiv:0911.3652. Bibcode:2010ApJ...708.1204B. doi:10.1088/0004-637X/708/2/1204. ISSN 0004-637X.
Selected lecture videos
edit- "The Photon Underproduction Crisis Solved: The Effect of AGN Feedback on the Low Redshift Lyman-alpha Forest", Institute for Theory and Computation, February 8, 2018
- Dr. Burkhart lecturing on “Galaxies as Star-Forming Engines: Simulating the Turbulent Birth of Stars”, Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Harvard, October 14, 2016[8]
Awards received
edit- Jansky Award, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Department of Astronomy, 2011[9]
- NASA's Wisconsin Space Grant Fellowship, 2013-14[10]
- Robert J. Trumpler Award, 2017[11]
- Annie Jump Cannon Award in Astronomy, 2019[1]
- Packard Fellowship for Science and Engineering, 2020[12]
- Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship, 2021[13]
- Maria Goeppert-Mayer Award, 2022[14]
References
edit- ^ a b "AAS Names Recipients of 2019 Awards & Honors | American Astronomical Society". American Astronomical Society. 2019-01-08. Archived from the original on 2019-01-09. Retrieved 2019-05-29.
- ^ Burkhart, Blakesley. "New frontiers for diagnosing the turbulent nature of the multiphase magnetized interstellar medium". Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin - Madision. Retrieved 2019-05-28.
- ^ "Burkhart Group Home Page".
- ^ Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian (2018-07-23). "How disc galaxies work". phys.org. Retrieved 2019-05-29.
- ^ Krumholz, Mark R; Burkhart, Blakesley; Forbes, John C; Crocker, Roland M (2018-06-21). "A unified model for galactic discs: star formation, turbulence driving, and mass transport". Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 477 (2): 2716–2740. arXiv:1706.00106. Bibcode:2018MNRAS.477.2716K. doi:10.1093/mnras/sty852. ISSN 0035-8711. S2CID 118882816.
- ^ "CCA's Blakesley Burkhart Awarded Annie Jump Cannon Award in Astronomy". Simons Foundation. 2019-01-09. Retrieved 2019-05-29.
- ^ "5 Minute Astronomy on Apple Podcasts". Apple Podcasts. Retrieved 2019-05-29.
- ^ "Next in Science: Astronomy and Astrophysics". Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University. 2016-08-05. Retrieved 2019-05-30.
- ^ "Blakesley Burkhart Wins Jansky Award| UW-Madison Astronomy". www.astro.wisc.edu. Retrieved 2019-05-29.
- ^ "Graduate & Professional Research Fellowship Award Recipients". spacegrant.carthage.edu. Retrieved 2019-05-29.
- ^ "ITC Postdoc Blakesley Burkhart's Thesis Wins Trumpler Award".
- ^ "2020 Class of Packard Fellows Announced". The David and Lucile Packard Foundation. 2020-10-15. Retrieved 2020-12-02.
- ^ "2021 Sloan Research Fellows".
- ^ "APS Mayer Award". www.aps.org. Retrieved 2022-04-14.