Caitlin Casey
University of California-Santa Barbara, CA·Astronomy & Astrophysics
Cosmic dust makes up less than one percent of a galaxy's mass, yet it changes how the galaxy looks. Dust absorbs ultraviolet and visible starlight and re-emits that energy as heat.
- Fields
Astronomy & Astrophysics
Physics
- Topics
cosmic dust
interstellar dust
dust emission
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Aug 2027
What they work on
- Characterize the thermal dust emission of galaxies across cosmic time using diverse far-infrared and millimeter (FIR/mm) observational datasets.
- Determine how dust in the most distant, early galaxies alters their observed light, combining data from multiple millimeter and radio telescopes.
- Clarify how efficiently dust absorbs ultraviolet and optical starlight and re-radiates it in the FIR/mm, by comparing dust emission with stellar emission in galaxy spectra.
More about the research
As a result, about half of all light from galaxies beyond our own emerges at far-infrared and millimeter (FIR/mm) wavelengths. Early galaxies held more dust, so understanding dust emission is key to knowing how galaxies formed and changed over cosmic time. Even so, dust's heat glow is far less understood than the light from stars.
Why it matters
This is basic research on how dust shapes what astronomers can see of distant galaxies. Better measurements of dust's infrared and millimeter glow add to understanding of how galaxies, stars and planets form, and could improve how astronomers correct for dust when reconstructing the history of galaxy growth across cosmic time.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Katherine Suess
University of Colorado Boulder, CO·Astronomy & Astrophysics
Measure dust and cold gas masses in about 50 post-starburst galaxies, which recently ended star formation, using multi-wavelength telescope data.
Kate Rowlands
Johns Hopkins University, MD·Astronomy & Astrophysics
Map recent star-formation histories in nearby galaxies using full spectral fitting of KILOGAS data, and compare them with current interstellar gas to see how star formation depends on available gas.
Marc Rafelski
Johns Hopkins University, MD·Astronomy & Astrophysics
Directly image galaxies identified by Damped Lyman-alpha absorption, dense neutral hydrogen seen in background spectra, using the Atacama Large Millimeter Array to locate counterparts selected independently of brightness.
The school
University of California-Santa Barbara: 17 labs on PI Pages, $303M a year on research, 403 research doctorates a year.
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