Sashabaw Niedbalski
Astronomy & Space Sciences
Summary
Hello! I am a first-year graduate student looking to focus on theoretical and experimental astrophysics. My topics of interest include radio astronomy, pulsar detection, GR, and QFT.
My undergraduate research at Hillsdale College, where I received my B.S. in Physics and Applied Mathematics this last spring, was with Prof. Tim Dolch and centered around radio astronomy and pulsar detection. During my time at Hillsdale, I helped construct the fifth Low-Frequency All-Sky Monitor (LoFASM V) radio telescope array and wrote python scripts to streamline the viewing and cataloging efforts of the incoming telescope data. I also spent time with Prof. Dolch during the semesters on different projects related to his work with the North American Nanohertz Observatory for Gravitational Waves (NANOGrav). My senior thesis was on developing numerical methods for reducing eccentricity in simulated black hole binary mergers using post-Newtonian theory up to 3.5 order, the NSF-funded research for which I completed during the summer of 2020 and the following school year with Prof. David Neilsen of BYU.
Outside of astronomy, I enjoy spending my free time reading fantasy books (I'm currently over halfway through Robert Jordan's "Wheel of Time" series), playing board games and MTG, spending time outdoors, playing the violin, and exercising.