AstroNu
AstroNu is a research group at the Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen. We are affiliated with the Niels Bohr International Academy and DARK and work at the intersection between astrophysics and fundamental physics.
Our team aims at unveiling the nature of fascinating weakly interacting elementary particles, such as the neutrino, and explores the role of these particles in astrophysical sources, in the synthesis of new elements, and in the Early Universe. The AstroNu group also adopts neutrinos as probes of the inner workings of astrophysical transients together with photons, cosmic rays, and gravitational waves.
Our activities are supported by the University of Copenhagen, the Villum Foundation, the Knud Højgaard Foundation, the Carlsberg Foundation, the Danmarks Frie Forskningsfond, and the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft.
The AstroNu group is actively engaged in supporting underrepresented groups and enhancing diversity at the Niels Bohr Institute. We firmly believe that a diverse and inclusive scientific environment is beneficial to our research work.
Current Group members
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Irene Tamborra, Professor & Group Leader
Email: tamborra*nbi.ku.dk Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
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Rasmus S. L. Hansen, INTERACTIONS Postdoctoral Fellow Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
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Shashank Shalgar, Postdoctoral Fellow
Email: shashank.shalgar*nbi.ku.dk Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
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Ersilia Guarini, PhD student Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
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Ian Padilla-Gay, PhD student Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
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Tetyana Pitik, PhD student Email: Tetyana.Pitik*nbi.ku.dk Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
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Jonathan Bödewadt, Exchange Student, University of Hamburg, Germany Email: jonathan*bodewadt.de Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
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Arun Krishna Ganesan, Master Student Email: wzc189*alumni.ku.dk Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
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Garðar Sigurðarson, Master Student Email: jcs272*alumni.ku.dk Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
Affiliated scientists
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Meng-Ru Wu, Assistant Research Fellow (Academia Sinica, Taiwan)
Email: mwu*gate.sinica.edu.tw Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
Former group members
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Anna Suliga, PhD Student Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
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Lila Sarfati, Exchange Student, Ecole Normale Supérieure, Paris, France Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
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Laurie Walk, PhD Student |
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Rohan Kumar,MSc Student Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
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Daniel Abdulla Bobruk, MSc Student (2020 --> CERN Internship)
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Mauricio Bustamante, Postdoctoral Fellow Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
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Marie-Louise Riis, MSc Student Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
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Charlotte A. Rosenstrøm, MSc Student Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
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Karen Macías Cárdenas, Exchange Student, Autonomous University of Baja California, Mexico (2019-2020 --> Graduate student, Queen's University, Canada) |
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Kilian Hersent, Exchange Student, Ecole Nationale Supérieure de Techniques Avancées, Paris, France (2019) |
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Peter Denton, Postdoctoral Fellow
(2016-2018. ---> Assistant Physicist, Brookhaven National Laboratory, US) Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
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Klaes Møller, MSc Student
(2017-2018) Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
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Anna Suliga, MSc Student
(2017-2018 ---> PhD Student at Niels Bohr Institute, Denmark) Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
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Veronica Sølund Kirsebom, MSc Student
(2016-2018. ---> PhD Student at École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland) |
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Meng-Ru Wu, Postdoctoral Fellow
(2016-2017. ---> Assistant Research Fellow at Academia Sinica, Taiwan) Publications: ADS, INSPHIRE-HEP |
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Mia-Louise Nielsen, BSc Student
(2017) |
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Bo Schmidt, Research Assistant
(2017) |
Neutrinos are fascinating elementary particles. They vastly outnumber all other particles in our Universe, except photons. Neutrinos interact very weakly and exist in three distinct families or “flavors” which oscillate (convert) into each other by flavor mixing.
In addition to the Early Universe, neutrinos are copiously produced in a variety of astrophysical environments, ranging from stars like the Sun to the most extreme astrophysical transients such as core-collapse supernovae and neutron-star mergers. Many cosmic accelerators, such as gamma-ray bursts, starburst galaxies or active galactic nuclei, should also produce neutrinos.
Owing to their weak interactions, neutrinos have the extraordinary ability to escape undisturbed from cosmic sources and carry information on sites otherwise unreachable. Moreover, neutrinos and particles beyond the ones predicted within the Standard Model dramatically affect the dynamics of their sources and the synthesis of new elements.
The AstroNu group aims at addressing the following questions:
- Which is the role of weakly interacting particles and their interactions in dense astrophysical environments, such as core-collapse supernovae and neutron-star mergers?
- What is the impact of neutrino flavor conversions on the stellar dynamics and formation of elements in the Universe?
- What are the experimentally detectable imprints of the source dynamics carried by neutrinos?
- How can we learn about standard and non-standard properties of weakly interacting particles through astrophysical sources?
- How are neutrinos produced in cosmic accelerators? And what can we learn about the physics of these mysterious events?
- What are the chances of detecting cosmic neutrinos and other weakly interacting particles with existing and upcoming neutrino telescopes?
2021
- R. Alves Batista et al., EuCAPT White Paper: Opportunities and Challenges for Theoretical Astroparticle Physics in the Next Decade, arXiv: 2110.10074.
- T. Pitik, I. Tamborra, C. R. Angus, K. Auchettl, Is the high-energy neutrino event IceCube-200530A associated with a hydrogen rich superluminous supernova?, arXiv: 2110.06944.
- L. Sarfati, R. S. L. Hansen, I. Tamborra, Triangulating Black Hole Forming Collapses through Neutrinos, arXiv: 2110.02347.
- I. Padilla-Gay, I. Tamborra, G. Raffelt, Neutrino flavor pendulum reloaded: The case of fast pairwise conversion, arXiv: 2109.14627.
- I. Padilla-Gay, S. Shalgar, Fast flavor conversion of neutrinos in presence of matter bulk velocity, arXiv: 2108.00012.
- S. Shalgar, I. Tamborra, Symmetry breaking induced by pairwise conversion of neutrinos in compact sources, arXiv: 2106.15622.
- D. Das et al., A three Higgs doublet model with symmetry-suppressed flavour changing neutral currents, arXiv: 2106.06425.
- S. Shalgar, I. Tamborra, The three flavor revolution in fast pairwise neutrino conversion, Phys. Rev. D 104 (2021) 023011 [arXiv: 2103.12743].
- T. Pitik, I. Tamborra, M. Petropoulou, Neutrino signal dependence on gamma-ray burst emission mechanism, JCAP 05 (2021) 034 [arXiv: 2102.02223].
2020
- N. Song et al., The Future of High-Energy Astrophysical Neutrino Flavor Measurements, JCAP 04 (2021) 054 [arXiv: 2012.12893].
- A. M. Suliga, S. Shalgar, G. M. Fuller, A closer look at the pp-chain reaction in the Sun: Constraining the coupling of light mediators to protons, JCAP 07 (2021) 042 [arXiv: 2012.11620].
- S. Abbar, F. Capozzi, R. Glas, H.-T. Janka, I. Tamborra, On the characteristics of fast neutrino flavor instabilities in three-dimensional core-collapse supernova models, Phys. Rev. D 103 (2021) no. 6, 063033 [arXiv: 2012.06594].
- R. S. L. Hansen, S. Shalgar, I. Tamborra, Neutrino flavor mixing breaks isotropy in the early universe, JCAP 07 (2021) 017 [arXiv: 2012.03948].
- I. Tamborra, S. Shalgar, New Developments in Flavor Evolution of a Dense Neutrino Gas, Ann. Rev. Nucl. Part. Sci. 71 (2021) 165-188 [arXiv: 2011.01948].
- S. Shalgar, I. Tamborra, A change of direction in pairwise neutrino conversion physics: The effect of collisions, Phys. Rev. D 103 (2021) 063002 [arXiv: 2011.00004].
- S. Al Kharusi et al., SNEWS 2.0: A Next-Generation SuperNova Early Warning System for Multi-Messenger Astronomy, New J. Phys. 23 (2021) 031201 [arXiv: 2011.00035].
- A. M. Suliga, I. Tamborra, Astrophysical constraints on non-standard coherent neutrino-nucleus scattering, Phys. Rev. D 103 (2021) 083002 [arXiv: 2010.14545].
- M. George, M.-R. Wu, I. Tamborra, R. Ardevol-Pulpillo, H.-T. Janka, Fast neutrino flavor conversion, ejecta properties, and nucleosynthesis in newly-formed hypermassive remnants of neutron-star mergers, Phys. Rev. D 102 (2020) no. 10 [arXiv: 2009.04046].
- I. Padilla-Gay, S. Shalgar, I. Tamborra, Multi-Dimensional Solution of Fast Neutrino Conversions in Binary Neutron Star Merger Remnants, JCAP 01 (2021) 017 [arXiv: 2009.01843].
- M. Ahlers, M. Bustamante, N. G. Nortvig Willesen, Flavors of Astrophysical Neutrinos with Active-Sterile Mixing, JCAP 07 (2021) 029 [arXiv: 2009.01253].
- M. Bustamante, I. Tamborra, Using High-Energy Neutrinos as Cosmic Magnetometers, Phys. Rev. D 102 (2020) 12, 123008 [arXiv: 2009.01306].
- S. Shalgar, I. Tamborra, Dispelling a myth on dense neutrino media: fast pairwise conversions depend on energy, JCAP 01 (2021) 014 [arXiv: 2007.07926].
- A.M. Suliga, I. Tamborra, M.-R. Wu, Lifting the core-collapse supernova bounds on keV-mass sterile neutrinos, JCAP 08 (2020) 018 [arXiv: 2004.11389].
- L. Pattavina, N. Ferreiro Iachellini, I. Tamborra, Neutrino observatory based on archeological lead, Phys. Rev. D 102 (2020) no. 6, 063001 [arXiv: 2004.06936].
- M. Bustamante, New limits on neutrino decay from the Glashow resonance of high-energy cosmic neutrinos, arXiv: 2004.06844.
- T. Hasegawa et al., MeV-scale reheating temperature and cosmological production of light sterile neutrinos, JCAP 08 (2020) 015 [arXiv: 2003.13302].
- M. Bustamante, C. Rosenstroem, S. Shalgar, I. Tamborra, Bounds on secret neutrino interactions from high-energy astrophysical neutrinos, Phys. Rev. D 101 (2020) no.12, 123024 [arXiv: 2001.04994].
2019
- S. Shalgar, I. Tamborra, M. Bustamante, Core-collapse supernovae stymie secret neutrino interactions, Phys. Rev. D 103 (2021) 123008 [arXiv: 1912.09115].
- S. Shalgar, I. Padilla-Gay, I. Tamborra, Neutrino propagation hinders fast pairwise flavor conversions, JCAP 06 (2020) 048 [arXiv: 1911.09110].
- L. Walk, I. Tamborra, H.-T. Janka, A. Summa, D. Kresse, Neutrino emission characteristics of black hole formation in three-dimensional simulations of stellar collapse, Phys. Rev. D 101 (2020) no.12, 123013 [arXiv: 1910.12971].
- E. Vitagliano, I. Tamborra, G. Raffelt, Grand Unified Neutrino Spectrum at Earth, Rev. Mod. Phys. 92 (2020) 045006 [arXiv: 1910.11878].
- A. M. Suliga, I. Tamborra, M.-R. Wu, Tau lepton asymmetry by sterile neutrino emission -- Moving beyond one-zone models, JCAP 12 (2019) 019 [arXiv: 1908.11382].
- J. R. Westernacher-Schneider, E. O'Connor, E. O'Sullivan, I. Tamborra, M.-R. Wu, S. M. Couch, F. Malmenbeck, Multimessenger Asteroseismology of Core-Collapse Supernovae, Phys. Rev. D 100 (2019) 12 [arXiv: 1907.01138].
- M. Bustamante, Exact neutrino oscillation probabilities: a fast general-purpose computation method for two and three neutrino flavors, arXiv: 1904.12391.
- S. Shalgar and I. Tamborra, On the Occurrence of Crossings Between the Angular Distributions of Electron Neutrinos and Antineutrinos in the Supernova Core, Astrophys. J. 883 (2019) 80 [arXiv: 1904.07236].
- C. Fryer et al., Core-Collapse Supernovae and Multi-Messenger Astronomy, Bull. Am. Astron. Soc. 51 (2019) 122.
- R. Alves Batista et al., Open Questions in Cosmic-Ray Research at Ultrahigh Energies, Front. Astron. Space Sci. 6 (2019) 23 [arXiv: 1903.06714].
- M. Ackermann et al., Astrophysics Uniquely Enabled by Observations of High-Energy Cosmic Neutrinos, Bull. Am. Astron. Soc. 51 (2019) 185 [arXiv: 1903.04334].
- M. Ackermann et al., Fundamental Physics with High-Energy Cosmic Neutrinos, Bull. Am. Astron. Soc. 51 (2019) 215 [arXiv: 1903.04333].
- M. Bustamante and M. Ahlers, Inferring the flavor of high-energy astrophysical neutrinos at their sources, Phys. Rev. Lett. 122 (2019) no. 24, 241101 [arXiv: 1901.10087].
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L. Walk, I. Tamborra, H.-T. Janka, A. Summa, Effects of SASI and LESA in the neutrino emission of rotating supernovae, Phys. Rev. D 100 (2019) no.6, 063018 [arXiv: 1901.06235].
2019
- Masaru Shibata (AEI, Potsdam), Nov. 2019
- George M. Fuller (UC, San Diego), Aug. 2019
- Angela Olinto (U. of Chicago), Aug. 2019
- Alessandro Mirizzi (Bari U.), June 2019
- Francis Halzen (University Wisconsin-Madison), Jan. 2019
2018
- Kate Scholberg (Duke U.), July 2018
- Samaya Nissanke (U. of Amsterdam), July 2018
- Sera Markoff (U. of Amsterdam), July 2018
- Sebastian Heinz (U. of Wisconsin), July 2018
- Wick Haxton (UC, Berkeley), July 2018
- Jonathan Gair (U. of Edinburg), July 2018
- Johan Samsing (Princeton), June 2018
- Alexei Yu. Smirnov (MPIK, Heidelberg), Mar. 2018
- Stephen Parke (Fermilab), Feb. 2018
2017
- Elisa Resconi (TUM, Munich), Dec. 2017
- Anna Franckowiak (DESY Zeuthen), Nov. 2017
- Eli Waxman (Weizmann Institute of Science), Nov. 2017
- Fiorenza Donato (INFN & University of Turin), Oct. 2017
- Jeremiah Murphy (Florida State University), July 2017
- Manibrata Sen (TIFR, Mumbai), June 2017
- Kohta Murase (Penn State University), June 2017
- Shin'ichiro Ando (GRAPPA, Amsterdam), May 2017
- Andreas Bauswein (HITS, Heidelberg), Feb. 2017
2016
- Pasquale Serpico (LAPTh, Annecy), Dec. 2016
- Licia Verde (ICC, Barcelona), Nov. 2016
- Christoph Weniger (GRAPPA, Amsterdam), Nov. 2016
- Manuel Meyer (OKC, Stockholm), Nov. 2016
- Martin Pohl (DESY Zeuthen & Potsdam University), Oct. 2016
- Torsten Enßlin (MPA, Garching), Sep. 2016
- Steen Hannestad (Aarhus U.), Aug. 2016
- Eligio Lisi (INFN, Bari), Aug. 2016
- Teresa Montaruli (U. of Geneva), Aug. 2016
- Mauricio Bustamante (Ohio State University), May 2016
- A change of direction in pairwise neutrino conversion physics: The effect of collisions, S. Shalgar, I. Tamborra, Phys. Rev. D 103 (2021) 063002 [arXiv: 2011.00004].
- Dispelling a myth on dense neutrino media: fast pairwise conversions depend on energy, S. Shalgar, I. Tamborra, JCAP 01 (2021) 014 [arXiv: 2007.07926].
- Neutrino propagation hinders fast pairwise flavor conversions, S. Shalgar, I. Padilla-Gay, I. Tamborra, JCAP 06 (2020) 048 [arXiv: 1911.09110].
- Neutrino emission characteristics of black hole formation in three-dimensional simulations of stellar collapse, L. Walk, I. Tamborra, H.-T. Janka, A. Summa, D. Kresse, Phys. Rev. D 101 (2020) no.12, 123013 [arXiv: 1910.12971].
- Identifying rotation with neutrinos in three-dimensional core-collapse supernovae, L. Walk, I. Tamborra, H.-T. Janka, A. Summa, Phys. Rev. D 98 (2018), no. 1, 123001 [arXiv: 1807.02366]. Phys. Rev. D 100 (2019) no. 6, 063018, [arXiv: 1901.06235].
- Flavor dependent neutrino angular distributions in core-collapse supernovae, I. Tamborra, L. Huedepohl, G. Raffelt, H.-T. Janka, Astrophys. J. 893, 132 (2017), [arXiv: 1702.00060].
- Anna Suliga successfully defends her PhD thesis (Oct. 2021)
- Ersilia Guarini is awarded the "Milla Baldo Ceolin" award from the National Institute for Nuclear Physics (INFN) in Italy for the best MSc thesis in Theoretical Physics (July 2021).
- Anna Suliga is awarded the flash talk award at the XIX International Workshop on Neutrino Telescopes (Feb. 2021)
- Laurie Walk successfully defends her PhD thesis (Jan. 2021)
- Irene Tamborra receives Villum Young Investigator Plus grant (Jan. 2021)
- Ersilia Guarini joins the AstroNu group as PhD Student (Jan. 2021)
- Irene Tamborra receives the KiF Prize (Oct. 2020)
- Mauricio Bustamante receives Villum Young Investigator grant (Dec. 2019)
- Laurie Walk is awarded the best student presentation prize at the 30th Texas Symposium on Relativistic Astrophysics (Dec. 2019)
- Ian Padilla-Gay and Tetyana Pitik join the AstroNu group as PhD Students (Sept. 2019)
- Rasmus S. L. Hansen joins the AstroNu group as Postdoctoral Fellow (Sept. 2019)
- Irene Tamborra receives the Shakti P. Duggal Award (July 2019)
- Kilian Hersent and Karen Macías Cárdenas join the AstroNu group as exchange students (May 2019)
- Irene Tamborra receives the MERAC Prize for the Best Early Career Researcher (Mar. 2019)
- Irene Tamborra receives the Sapere Aude Grant (Dec. 2018)
- Irene Tamborra receives the Carlsberg Distinguished Associate Professor Fellowship (Nov. 2018)
- Peter Denton starts a tenure-track faculty job at Brookhaven National Laboratory (Oct. 2018)
- Anna Suliga joins the AstroNu group as PhD Student (Sept. 2018)
- Shashank Shalgar joins the AstroNu group as Postdoctoral Fellow (Sept. 2018)
- Anna Suliga receives the Lørup Fonden Award for academic excellence and original MSc thesis work (July 2018)
- Laurie Walk joins the AstroNu group as PhD Student (Sept. 2017)
- Mauricio Bustamante joins the AstroNu group as Postdoctoral Fellow (Sept. 2017)
- Meng-Ru Wu starts a tenure-track faculty job at Academia Sinica (Sept. 2017)
- Veronica Sølund Kirsebom selected CERN Summer Student 2017 (June 2017)
- Irene Tamborra receives Diversity Grant from the University of Copenhagen (Apr. 2017)
- Irene Tamborra appointed Associate Professor at the Niels Bohr Institute (Apr. 2017)
- Irene Tamborra appointed Mercator Fellow for SFB 1258 (Jan. 2017)
- Peter Denton joins the AstroNu group as Postdoctoral Fellow (Sept. 2016)
- Meng-Ru Wu joins the AstroNu group as Postdoctoral Fellow (Sept. 2016)
- Irene Tamborra receives Villum Young Investigator Grant (Jan. 2016)
- Irene Tamborra is new Knud Højgaard Assistant Professor at the NBIA (Nov. 2015)
In the Media
- Astronomiens tredje øje (Aug. 2019, in Danish)
- Possible explanation for excess of electron neutrinos detected by IceCube Neutrino Observatory (Oct. 2018)
- Vers une désintégration des neutrinos mu et tau? (Sept. 2018, in French)
- Neutrinos may decay invisibly, resolving problems in IceCube data (Sept. 2018)
- Stor Langsom Stjerne (July 2017, in Danish)
There are several projects at the Bachelor, Master, and PhD level within our group. Please do not hesitate in contacting Prof. Irene Tamborra if you are interested or just want to learn more about any of these.
If you are interested in joining the AstroNu group as postdoctoral fellow, follow the announcements on Academic Jobs Online. You could also consider to apply for individual national and international fellowships. Please, get in touch with Prof. Irene Tamborra, if you like to discuss the latter option further.
Seminars and Meetings
- Once a week we host an Astroparticle Physics Seminar on a broad range of topics of interest to particle astrophysics, astrophysics and cosmology. The seminars usually take place in Auditorium A on Mondays at 14:15.
- Once every other week we host an informal astroparticle journal club, in which group members and visitors discuss recent research papers or other topics of interest. The journal club takes place on Thursdays at 12:30 in room Bk2.
- Every other Tuesday at 13:15 at DARK we host an informal discussion on astrophysical transients.
PhD Schools
- Advancing Theoretical Astrophysics Summer School, Amsterdam, 15-26 July 2019.
- Multi-Messengers from Compact Sources, Copenhagen, 2-6 July 2018.
- Neutrinos Underground & in the Heavens, Copenhagen, 1-5 Aug. 2016.
Conferences and Workshops
- NBIA-LANL Neutrino Quantum Kinetics in Dense Environments, Copenhagen, 26-30 Aug. 2019.
- Physics and Astrophysics in the Era of Gravitational Wave Detection, Copenhagen, Aug. 19-23, 2019.
- MITP workshop "Supernova Neutrino Observations: What can we learn and do?", Mainz, 9-13 Oct. 2017.
Networking
- Our group is involved in the activities of the Collaborative Research Center: Neutrinos and Dark Matter in Astro- and Particle Physics, Technical University of Munich.
- Our group is involved in COST Action 15108 and COST Action 18108.
Teaching
- Fundaments of High-Energy Astrophysics and Particle Astrophysics [2019/2020 & 2018/2019, block 4].
- Gravitational dynamics and galaxy formation [2016/2017, block 3 & 2017/2018, block 3].
Our group is based at the Niels Bohr International Academy, Niels Bohr Institute, Blegdamsvej 17, 2100 Copenhagen, Denmark.
Professor, Irene Tamborra
Phone: + 45 35 33 32 27
Email: tamborra*nbi.ku.dk
NBIA Research Academic Officer, Jane Elvekjær
Phone: +45 35325364
Email: jane.elvekjaer *nbi.ku.dk