Cullen Blake
Assistant Professor
Education:
Ph.D. (Astronomy), Harvard University June 2009
Advisors: David Charbonneau and David W. Latham
A.M. (Astronomy), Harvard University June 2006
A.B. with honors (Astrophysics), Princeton University June 2003
Advisors: Bohdan Paczynski and David Spergel
Research Interests:
My primary research interests fall into two broad categories:
- The search for Earth-like planets orbiting low-mass stars
- The structure and evolution of low-mass stars and brown dwarfs
As an observational astronomer, one of my main goals is to develop
measurement techniques that will enable the detection and
characterization of Earth-analogs orbiting low-mass stars.
These same techniques can be used to improve our understanding
of stellar astrophysics at the bottom of the main sequence.
I believe that robotic telescopes can play an important role
in many areas of modern astrophysics and I have worked on
both optical and infrared instrumentation projects.
I also make use of photometric and spectroscopic data from
massive variability surveys and am interested in synoptic
surveys as both a way to identify transient astrophysical
phenomena and as a powerful tool for learning about
low-mass stars.
CV (file):
