Collaboration including associate professor of astrophysics Chris Richardson will use Chandra and Gemini Observatories to detect black hole signatures
The RESOLVE survey collaboration based at UNC – Chapel Hill includes researchers from nearby institutions and abroad that study dwarf galaxies in a number of ways. Associate Professor of Astrophysics Chris Richardson performs simulations of galaxies to predict with other members of the RESOLVE team might see.
Those predictions helped spur two proposals, in which Richardson is a co-investigator, subjected to a peer-review process similar to National Science Foundation grant funding. The recently accepted proposals provide observational time on the Gemini and Chandra Observatories to look for signatures of black hole activity. Such observations will help confirm or modify current theoretical models of black hole evolution in galaxies, which Elon undergraduates can use in their research projects.