Joshua Thomas, an associate professor of Physics at Clarkson University, and Director of the Reynolds Observatory has been awarded a $30K NYSG Faculty Fellowship grant from the New York Space Grant (NYSG) Consortium.
The fellowship will be used to upgrade the observatory equipment and fund two summer research students. The goal of the project is to measure the Extended Red Emission (ERE) in various nebulae, and search for a connection with Diffuse Interstellar Bands (DIBs). Both the ERE and DIBs are thought to be caused by carbon-rich molecules in space. The ERE is thought to be caused specifically by polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, but no one is certain what causes the DIBs.
The fellowship will also be used to support the work of graduate student Carlie Fowler ‘21.
Professor Thomas joined the faculty at Clarkson in the fall of 2012, where he teaches introductory physics and astrophysics. He concentrates his research on Stellar spectroscopy: binary stars, Be, and Wolf-Rayet stars, astrophysical disks and jets, laboratory astrophysics, numerical simulation, and image analysis.
Thomas has written academic articles and made numerous presentations and scholarly talks on his field over the years.
