Research Interests


I work with the SAGE (Survey of the Agents of a Galaxy's Evolution) team under Dr. Margaret Meixner (STScI)

SAGE (Meixner et al 2006) is a Spitzer Space Telescope Legacy survey of the Large Magellanic Cloud. The SAGE point source catalog has been combined with the near-infrared 2-micron All Sky Survey (2MASS, Skrutskie et al 2006) and the optical Magellanic Cloud Photometric Survey (MCPS, Zaritsky et al 1997) point source catalogs, resulting in a rich multi-band database for studying infrared sources such as planetary nebulae and asymptotic giant branch (AGB) stars. The Massive Compact Halo Object (MACHO, Fraser et al 2005) catalog of LMC point sources also complements this data.

It is easier to study AGBs in the LMC than in the Milky Way because they are effectively at the same distance from us, and our view is not obscured by Milky Way dust (this dust messes up estimates of distances to AGBs in our galaxy). We have identified tens of thousands of AGB candidates in the LMC.

My research deals with the problem of mass loss in AGB stars. The mechanism of mass loss is uncertain, and its dependence on different stellar and environmental parameters has not yet been determined. Related fields such as stellar population modeling will benefit from a better understanding of the mass loss problem.