Kate Rowlands
Johns Hopkins University, MD·Astronomy & Astrophysics
Galaxies form stars from cold molecular gas, but some form stars quickly while others stop. The central black holes in galaxies may help shut star formation down by pouring energy into their surroundings, a process called feedback.
- Fields
Astronomy & Astrophysics
Physics
- Topics
galaxy evolution
star formation
molecular gas
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Aug 2029
What they work on
- Map recent star-formation histories in nearby galaxies using full spectral fitting of KILOGAS data, and compare them with current interstellar gas to see how star formation depends on available gas.
- Derive the past energy output of accreting black holes (active galactic nuclei) from extended emission-line regions, to estimate the combined effect of black hole feedback on their host galaxies.
- Investigate why star-formation efficiency varies across galaxies and test fundamental star formation laws, using ALMA molecular gas maps of 500 galaxies in the KILOGAS survey.
More about the research
Understanding what drives or suppresses star formation is key to explaining how galaxies change over time. It also matters for building realistic computer simulations of the universe.
Why it matters
This is basic science. The work adds understanding of how gas supply and black hole activity control where and how fast galaxies form stars. Its measurements could serve as benchmarks for testing cosmological simulations of galaxy evolution. They could also help test fundamental theories of star formation and explain galaxy scaling relations.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Karen Masters
Haverford College, PA·Astronomy & Astrophysics
Test whether atomic hydrogen (HI) depletion times in MaNGA galaxies vary with ionization and heating sources, using HI-MaNGA 21 cm data combined with MaNGA galaxy maps.
Katherine Suess
University of Colorado Boulder, CO·Astronomy & Astrophysics
Measure dust and cold gas masses in about 50 post-starburst galaxies, which recently ended star formation, using multi-wavelength telescope data.
John Bally
University of Colorado Boulder, CO·Astronomy & Astrophysics
Map molecular gas across the entire Milky Way Central Molecular Zone at high resolution with the ALMA telescope as part of the ACES survey, tracing gas motions with more than a dozen molecular tracers.
The school
Johns Hopkins University: 100 labs on PI Pages, $4.1B a year on research, 622 research doctorates a year.
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