I’m an astronomy professor at the University of Washington. My research combines observations and theory to explain how the largest (and weirdest!) stars in the universe evolve and die. I’m also a Science Editor for the AAS Journals and the current chair of the James Webb Space Telescope Users Committee and the AAS Working Group on Graduate Admissions.

I was most recently a 2022-2023 Fulbright U.S. Scholar and a 2022 Guggenheim Fellow. I’ve received the American Astronomical Society’s 2023 Chambliss Astronomical Writing Award, the 2020 Newton Lacy Pierce prize, and the 2014 Annie Jump Cannon award. I’m also a 2019 Cottrell Scholar, a 2018 Kavli Fellow, and a 2017 Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow. From 2010 to 2015 I was a Hubble and Einstein postdoctoral fellow at the University of Colorado at Boulder. I received my astronomy PhD at University of Hawaii in 2010 and my S.B. in physics from MIT in 2006.

My first popular science book, The Last Stargazers, shares the tales and adventures of astronomical observing and was an Amazon Best Book of 2020 and a finalist for the Royal Society Science Book Prize, the PEN/E.O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award, and the AAAS/Subaru SB&F Prize for Excellent in Science Books. I’ve also written two academic books (a professional text on red supergiants and a graduate textbook on stellar interiors and evolution written with co-author Henny J. G. L. M. Lamers) and filmed a lecture series on Great Heroes and Discoveries of Astronomy with The Great Courses. You can learn more on my Books page!