NBIA Colloquium by Victor Silva Aguirre (Aarhus University)

Galactic archaeology, unraveling the history of the Milky Way

Speaker: Victor Silva Aguirre (Aarhus University)

Abstract: Understanding the formation and evolution of the Milky Way is one of the most fundamental and still unresolved problems in astrophysics. Our Galaxy has been shaped throughout its lifetime by different physical processes that left a unique imprint in its fossil remnants: stars. Decoding the history of the Milky Way from these "near-field cosmological signatures", a field known as Galactic Archaeology, is a crucial step towards achieving a successful theory of galaxy formation. In this talk I will explain the methods used for determining properties of stars across the Galaxy, and how we can use them to disentangle the physical mechanisms that gave birth to the Milky Way as it is today.

Bio-Sketch: Victor Silva Aguirre earned his Master’s degrees in mechanical engineering and astrophysics at Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile. He moved to Munich, Germany where he obtained his PhD at the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics and the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität. In 2012, and right after finishing his PhD, he began a postdoctoral position at Aarhus University. He was appointed tenure track assistant professor in 2017 and became an associate professor in 2019. Victor’s research interests span from stellar structure and evolution to galaxy formation, and his most important contributions to these fields have been made using the technique of asteroseismology to probe the interior of stars. Victor is chair of the international collaborations exploiting the asteroseismic data of red giant stars from the Kepler, K2, and TESS space missions. His research ideas have helped bridging the gap between the small stellar scale and the large cosmological scale, and have been supported by the Villum Young Investigator, the DFF Sapere Aude, and the Carlsberg Young research fellowships.

To participate on Friday, click on:

https://ucph-ku.zoom.us/s/61333932427

The colloquium will be moderated by Mauricio Bustamante and we strongly encourage you to participate actively by asking questions during the talk. Mauricio will briefly remind you how this can be done just before the colloquium starts.