My work focuses on the co-evolution of supermassive black holes (SMBHs) and their host galaxies. I'm particularly
interested in SMBH dynamical evolution within their galaxies and how it relates to SMBH binary formation and
mergers. I'm also interested in how and where SMBHs grow and how that growth can affect their host galaxy. Find below
more detailed topics about my research. Click the links for more information (maybe even too much!) about each topic
and learn more about what I've done and what I'm currently up to.
By utilizing a new method to model the dynamics of supermassive black holes
that I developed, I study the orbital evolution of SMBHs within galaxies. I'm interested in predicting
when and where SMBH mergers should occur and how often SMBHs become permanent
"wanderers", never making it to galactic center.
Supermassive black holes, despite being approximately the size of our solar system, can result in
highly energetic phenomena when they accrete nearby gas. This release of energy is what powers active
galactic nuclei (AGN), bright central regions of galaxies, and is thought to be a major reason why
most massive galaxies have little ongoing star formation at later times. Using high resolution cosmological
simulations, as well as some other state-of-the-art numerical techniques, I study how and why star formation becomes
quenched by feedback from AGN.
We have run the highest resolution cosmological simulation of a galaxy cluster to date (as of
the writing of this page). We are able to study how
AGN feedback is able to regulate star
formation in the most massive galaxies with unprecedented detail. With such high resolution, we are
also able to examine the evolution of both massive galaxies and dwarfs in dense environments.
Leveraging the fact that RomulusC is run with the same resolution and physics as
Romulus25, we are able to directly compare galaxy evolution in different environments.
