Daryl Haggard

Last updated
Daryl Haggard
Born
Seattle, Washington, United States
Education St. John's College (BA)
San Francisco State University (MSc)
University of Washington (PhD)
Known forMulti-wavelength observations of the Milky Way Galactic Center and Sagittarius A*, X-ray observations of the binary neutron star merger GW170817
Awards CIFAR Azrieli Global Scholar (2017– 2019)
Scientific career
Fields Astronomy
Institutions McGill University
Thesis The Fraction of X-ray-active Galaxies in the Field from the Chandra Multiwavelength Project and the Sloan Digital Sky Survey  (2010)
Doctoral advisor Scott F. Anderson and Paul J. Green
Website Personal website

Daryl Haggard is an American-Canadian astronomer and associate professor of physics in the Department of Physics at McGill University and the McGill Space Institute. [1]

Contents

Early life and education

Haggard was born in Seattle, Washington, the fifth of eight children, and moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico at 6 months of age. [2] Haggard's father was a mathematician and college professor. Her mother trained as biologist and owns a native plant nursery in Santa Fe. [3]

She studied at St. John's College, receiving a Bachelors of Arts in philosophy and mathematics in May 1995. She became fascinated by orbital mechanics after reading Newton's Principia and realizing that mathematical equations could describe the orbits of planets. [3]

In 2004, Haggard received a Master of Science in physics from San Francisco State University, where she studied X-ray-emitting binary stars in the globular cluster Omega Centauri. She received a Ph.D. in astronomy from the University of Washington in 2010. Her thesis work focused on active galactic nuclei (accreting supermassive black holes at the center of distant galaxies). [4]

Career

After completing her Ph.D., Haggard accepted a postdoctoral fellowship at the Center for Interdisciplinary Exploration and Research in Astrophysics (CIERA) at Northwestern University. She spent one year as an assistant professor of astronomy in the Physics and Astronomy Department at Amherst College, before accepting an assistant professor position at McGill University and joining the newly formed McGill Space Institute in 2015. [3] [5]

Daryl Haggard's research group uses radio, submillimeter, near infrared, and X-ray telescopes to study compact objects, including active galactic nuclei, Sagittarius A* (the supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way galaxy) and the mergers of neutron stars. [6] [7]

In 2017, she led a team that used the Chandra X-ray Observatory to detect the afterglow of the merger of two neutron stars, GW170817, the first detection of X-rays from a gravitational wave source. [8] [9] Follow-up observations of the merger remnant by Haggard's group in 2017 showed the remnant grew brighter, rather than dimming, as expected. [10] [11] The remnant finally began to fade in X-ray observations taken in 2018, 260 days after the merger. [12]

She is currently a member of the Canadian Joint Committee on Space Astronomy, the Event Horizon Telescope Multiwavelength Coordination Team and the Thirty Meter Telescope International Science Development Team. [4] Haggard had also served on the American Astronomical Society (AAS) Governance Task Force, was the editor of the AASWOMEN Newsletter and was elected a member of the AAS High Energy Astrophysics Division (HEAD) Executive Committee. [3]

Awards and recognition

CIFAR Azrieli Global Scholar (2017–19) [6]

Kavli Frontiers Fellow (2014–2016) [13]

CIERA Postdoctoral Fellow (2010–2014) [14]

Personal life

Haggard resides in Montreal with her husband Nicolas Benjamin Cowan, an astronomer and planetary scientist. They have one son. [2]

Selected publications

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Neutron star</span> Collapsed core of a massive star

A neutron star is the collapsed core of a massive supergiant star, which had a total mass of between 10 and 25 solar masses (M☉), possibly more if the star was especially metal-rich. Except for black holes, neutron stars are the smallest and densest known class of stellar objects. Neutron stars have a radius on the order of 10 kilometers (6 mi) and a mass of about 1.4 M☉. They result from the supernova explosion of a massive star, combined with gravitational collapse, that compresses the core past white dwarf star density to that of atomic nuclei.

The following is a timeline of gravitational physics and general relativity.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stellar black hole</span> Black hole formed by a collapsed star

A stellar black hole is a black hole formed by the gravitational collapse of a star. They have masses ranging from about 5 to several tens of solar masses. The process is observed as a hypernova explosion or as a gamma ray burst. These black holes are also referred to as collapsars.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rogue planet</span> Planetary objects without a planetary system

A rogue planet is an interstellar object of planetary mass which is not gravitationally bound to any star or brown dwarf. Rogue planets originate from planetary systems in which they are formed and later ejected. They can also form on their own, outside a planetary system. The Milky Way alone may have billions to trillions of rogue planets, a range the upcoming Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope will likely be able to narrow down.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Einstein@Home</span> BOINC volunteer computing project that analyzes data from LIGO to detect gravitational waves

Einstein@Home is a volunteer computing project that searches for signals from spinning neutron stars in data from gravitational-wave detectors, from large radio telescopes, and from a gamma-ray telescope. Neutron stars are detected by their pulsed radio and gamma-ray emission as radio and/or gamma-ray pulsars. They also might be observable as continuous gravitational wave sources if they are rapidly spinning and non-axisymmetrically deformed. The project was officially launched on 19 February 2005 as part of the American Physical Society's contribution to the World Year of Physics 2005 event.

The Tolman–Oppenheimer–Volkoff limit is an upper bound to the mass of cold, non-rotating neutron stars, analogous to the Chandrasekhar limit for white dwarf stars. If the mass of a neutron star reaches the limit it will collapse to a denser form, most likely a black hole.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ofer Lahav</span>

Ofer Lahav is Perren Chair of Astronomy at University College London (UCL), Vice-Dean (International) of the UCL Faculty of Mathematical and Physical Sciences (MAPS) and Co-Director of the STFC Centre for Doctoral Training in Data Intensive Science. His research area is Observational Cosmology, in particular probing Dark Matter and Dark Energy. His work involves Machine Learning for Big Data.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Neutron star merger</span> Type of stellar collision

A neutron star merger is a type of stellar collision.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kilonova</span> Neutron star merger

A kilonova is a transient astronomical event that occurs in a compact binary system when two neutron stars or a neutron star and a black hole merge. These mergers are thought to produce gamma-ray bursts and emit bright electromagnetic radiation, called "kilonovae", due to the radioactive decay of heavy r-process nuclei that are produced and ejected fairly isotropically during the merger process. The measured high sphericity of the kilonova AT2017gfo at early epochs was deduced from the blackbody nature of its spectrum.

Multi-messenger astronomy is astronomy based on the coordinated observation and interpretation of signals carried by disparate "messengers": electromagnetic radiation, gravitational waves, neutrinos, and cosmic rays. They are created by different astrophysical processes, and thus reveal different information about their sources.

James Michael Lattimer is a nuclear astrophysicist who works on the dense nuclear matter equation of state and neutron stars.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">GW170817</span> Gravitational-wave signal detected in 2017

GW 170817 was a gravitational wave (GW) signal observed by the LIGO and Virgo detectors on 17 August 2017, originating from the shell elliptical galaxy NGC 4993. The signal was produced by the last minutes of a binary pair of neutron stars' inspiral process, ending with a merger. It is the first GW observation that has been confirmed by non-gravitational means. Unlike the five previous GW detections, which were of merging black holes not expected to produce a detectable electromagnetic signal, the aftermath of this merger was also seen by 70 observatories on 7 continents and in space, across the electromagnetic spectrum, marking a significant breakthrough for multi-messenger astronomy. The discovery and subsequent observations of GW 170817 were given the Breakthrough of the Year award for 2017 by the journal Science.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">NGC 4993</span> Galaxy in the constellation of Hydra

NGC 4993 is a lenticular galaxy located about 140 million light-years away in the constellation Hydra. It was discovered on 26 March 1789 by William Herschel and is a member of the NGC 4993 Group.

3XMM J004232.1+411314 is a low-mass X-ray binary hosted in the galaxy M31. It is the most luminous source of hard X-rays in the Andromeda Galaxy. It is also the most luminous source known that shows dips in the X-ray light curve. The compact object in this system has been unambiguously identified as a neutron star with a spin period of 3 seconds.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Zadko Observatory</span> Observatory

Zadko Observatory is an astronomical observatory located within the Wallingup Plain in the Gingin shire, Western Australia. It is owned and operated by the University of Western Australia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">PSR J0740+6620</span> Neutron star

PSR J0740+6620 is a neutron star in a binary system with a white dwarf, located 4,600 light years away in the Milky Way galaxy. It was discovered in 2019, by astronomers using the Green Bank Telescope in West Virginia, U.S., and confirmed as a rapidly rotating millisecond pulsar.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Teacup galaxy</span> Low redshift quasar in the constellation Boötes

The Teacup galaxy, also known as the Teacup AGN or SDSS J1430+1339 is a low redshift type 2 quasar, showing an extended loop of ionized gas resembling a handle of a teacup, which was discovered by volunteers of the Galaxy Zoo project and labeled as a Voorwerpje.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fast blue optical transient</span> Astronomical observation

In astronomy, a fast blue optical transient (FBOT), or technically, luminous fast blue optical transients (LFBOT), is an explosion event similar to supernovas and Gamma-ray bursts which presents high optical luminosity between those but rises and decays faster and has its spectra concentrated on the blue range. It is caused by some very high-energy astrophysical process not yet understood but thought to be a type of supernova with events occurring at not more than 0.1% of the typical rate.

Vuk Mandić is a Serbian-American astrophysicist and professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Minnesota. In 2017 he was elected a Fellow of the American Physical Society (APS).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">GRB 221009A</span> Gamma-ray burst

GRB 221009A also known as Swift J1913.1+1946 was an unusually bright and long-lasting gamma-ray burst (GRB) jointly discovered by the Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory and the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope on October 9, 2022. The gamma-ray burst was around seven minutes long, but was detectable for more than ten hours following initial detection and for several hours was bright enough in visible frequencies to be observable by amateur astronomers. The event yielded one of the closest gamma-ray bursts to Earth and is among the most energetic and luminous known to science. The peak luminosity of GRB 221009A was measured by Konus-Wind to be ∼ 2.1 × 1047 J/s and by Fermi-GBM to be ∼ 1.0 × 1047 J/s over the 1.024s interval. A burst as energetic and as close to Earth as 221009A is thought to be a once-in-10,000-year event. It was the brightest and most energetic gamma-ray burst ever recorded, being deemed the "BOAT", or brightest of all time.

References

  1. ↑ "Bio CIFAR".
  2. 1 2 Name, Your. "Daryl Haggard – McGill University – Personal". www.physics.mcgill.ca. Retrieved 2018-10-11.
  3. 1 2 3 4 Haggard, Daryl (2016-05-30). "Women In Astronomy: Meet your CSWA committee: Daryl Haggard". Women In Astronomy. Retrieved 2018-10-11.
  4. 1 2 Name, Your. "Daryl Haggard – McGill University – Bio". www.physics.mcgill.ca. Retrieved 2018-10-11.
  5. ↑ "McGill launches new Space Institute". Montreal Gazette. 2015-10-28. Retrieved 2018-10-11.
  6. 1 2 "Bio – Daryl Haggard". CIFAR. Retrieved 2018-10-11.
  7. ↑ "Milky Way's Monster Black Hole Belches Big, But Why?". Space.com. Retrieved 2018-10-11.
  8. ↑ "Chandra Makes First Detection of X-rays from a Gravitational Wave Source: Interview with Chandra Scientist Daryl Haggard | ChandraBlog | Fresh Chandra News". chandra.harvard.edu. Retrieved 2018-10-11.
  9. ↑ Haggard, Daryl; Nynka, Melania; Ruan, John J.; Kalogera, Vicky; Cenko, S. Bradley; Evans, Phil; Kennea, Jamie A. (2017-10-16). "A Deep Chandra X-Ray Study of Neutron Star Coalescence GW170817". The Astrophysical Journal. 848 (2): L25. arXiv: 1710.05852 . Bibcode:2017ApJ...848L..25H. doi:10.3847/2041-8213/aa8ede. ISSN   2041-8213. S2CID   55424196.
  10. ↑ "Here's Something Strange, the Afterglow From Last Year's Kilonova is Continuing to Brighten – Universe Today". Universe Today. 2018-01-22. Retrieved 2018-10-11.
  11. ↑ Ruan, John J.; Nynka, Melania; Haggard, Daryl; Kalogera, Vicky; Evans, Phil (2018). "Brightening X-Ray Emission from GW170817/GRB 170817A: Further Evidence for an Outflow". The Astrophysical Journal Letters. 853 (1): L4. arXiv: 1712.02809 . Bibcode:2018ApJ...853L...4R. doi:10.3847/2041-8213/aaa4f3. ISSN   2041-8205. S2CID   55664304.
  12. ↑ Nynka, Melania; Ruan, John J.; Haggard, Daryl; Evans, Phil A. (2018-07-31). "Fading of the X-Ray Afterglow of Neutron Star Merger GW170817/GRB 170817A at 260 Days". The Astrophysical Journal. 862 (2): L19. arXiv: 1805.04093 . Bibcode:2018ApJ...862L..19N. doi:10.3847/2041-8213/aad32d. ISSN   2041-8213. S2CID   54700363.
  13. ↑ "2015 Kavli Fellows – News Release". www.nasonline.org. Retrieved 2018-10-11.
  14. ↑ "Daryl Haggard – Center for Interdisciplinary Exploration and Research in Astrophysics (CIERA)". ciera.northwestern.edu. Retrieved 2018-10-11.
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