News
-
WASP-12b: The First Carbon-Rich Exoplanet
The transiting exoplanet WASP-12b is located some 870 light-years from Earth. This extremely irradiated planet orbits its Sun-like, G0 parent star in just over 26 hours, resulting in a dayside temperature of ~2,700 K (4,400 F). The tidal forces exerted by its star are sufficiently strong to distort the exoplanet into a prolate shape and…
/
-
Excitement builds for OSIRIS-REx launch
OSIRIS-REx is NASA’s New-Frontiers-class mission to visit a primitive asteroid and return a sample of it to Earth. Read about some of the UCF faculty and students who are involved with this exciting mission. The spacecraft is scheduled to launch from KSC on September 8.
/
-
Graduate Student wins Best Poster Competition at International Conference
Our graduate student, Jenna Crowell, has won the Best Student Poster Competition in the Planetary Science section at the recent Asia Oceania Geosciences Society annual conference, held in Beijing. Congratulations Jenna! She presented her research on thermophysical modeling of near-Earth asteroid 1627 Ivar.
/
-
Congratulations Dr. Tracy Becker!
Congratulations to our grad student expert on Saturn’s rings who successfully defended her dissertaiton in December. Tracy is now starting a postdoc at the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) in San Antonio, TX.
/
-
Congratulations Dr. Patricio Cubillos and Dr. Jasmina Blecic!
Our two resident grad student exoplanet experts have successfully defended their dissertations and have left us for postdocs. Patricio is now in the planetary department at the University of Graz, Austria, and Jasmina is now in Abu Dhabi working at NYU’s campus there.
/
-
Congratulations Dr. Kelsey Hargrove!
Kelsey Hargrove, has successfully defended her PhD dissertation on near- and mid-IR characterization of primitive asteroids. Congratulations Dr. Hargrove!
/
-
UCF invades DPS
The 46th Meeting of the Division for Planetary Sciences — the premiere planetary science conference in the U.S. and arguably in the world — is happening this week in Tucson, Arizona. There are 21 UCF-led presentations at this meeting. 75% of our graduate students wilil be there to present talks and posters.
/
-
Congratulations Dr. Nate Lust!
Nate Lust, one of our graduate students, has successfully defended his PhD dissertation on using new mathematical and statistical tehcniques to improve the signal-to-noise ratios and thus the interpretation of photometric data. Congratulations Dr. Lust!
/
-
Knights Observe the Moon Night
Robinson Observatory sponsored the make-up date for the International Observe the Moon Night. This was originally scheduled for September 6th but the event was clouded out. The make-up date had clear skies and the volunteers gave great views of the night sky to about 50 folks, both students and the general public.
/