Surveying the sky for hungry black holes at University of Sheffield on FindAPhD.com

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Dr J Mullaney Applications accepted all year round Self-Funded PhD Students Only

About the Project

Over the next few years, a new dimension in astronomy will reach maturity: the temporal dimension. Rather relying on static "photos" of the sky, astronomers will transition to "filming" sky night after night. This opens up the prospect of identifying many types of transient phenomena that we have had little or no chance of studying systematically before. Among these are short-lived events related to supermassive black holes, including so called "tidal disruption events" when a star is ripped apart by a black hole. In this project, you will exploit nightly-updated wide-field surveys of the sky to identify and study black-hole transient events as they happen. This project will involve the use and development of Big Data analytical tools to automatically identify rare transient events from vast amounts of imaging data.

For more information on this project please contact [Email Address Removed] . Information on the Sheffield Astrophysics Group can be found at https://www.sheffield.ac.uk/physics/research/astrophysics .

Funding Notes

It is very unlikely that this project will come with a studentship, but those with alternative sources of funding are encouraged to apply. Full details on how to apply can be found at https://www.sheffield.ac.uk/postgraduate/phd

Where will I study?

University of Sheffield

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