Research essay: mapping a star-forming region in 3D with Gaia astrometric data
Hello! I'm from Edinburgh, and am currently an Actuarial Trainee at Hymans Robertson. Prior to that, I studied Astrophysics at the University of St Andrews, where I was particularly interested in computational aspects of the field (handling and analysing observational data, and simulations). Away from academics, I enjoy playing a variety of sports, exploring the Scottish hills, and am a keen musician.
My research project in summer 2023 focused on mapping a region of the sky known to be star-forming, around the Monoceros constellation, with the hope of using analytical techniques to attempt to find new star clusters.
My LiA in summer 2024 was with the Timothy Smith Network in Boston, Massachusetts, teaching coding and microelectronics as part of the Elevating Agriculture Technology (EAT) course.
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Some great work here, and not one, but two potential clusters identified! Do you think your method used here could be used for other regions of space?
Hi Oliver! Excitingly, yes! There's nothing specific about my region of interest to this method - it should be equally applicable to any other regions of space to find clusters. I think refinements would be necessary before this wider application though, to improve the efficiency of the algorithm.