ABOUT ME
Research interests
My personal, long-term goal is to understand how chiral particles and radiation affect the mutation rate of biological molecules and by extension to understand if polarization of cosmic radiation can be translated to homochirality. I started to build an international network of collaborators to test this idea by performing radiation damage experiments. I also started to investigate the effect of polarized cosmic rays at planetary atmospheres and small bodies such as asteroids or icy moons like Enceladus or Europa.
To understand where life can form, we can study what are the fundamental features of life as we know it and search for the associated signatures in our solar system, or on exoplanets. The perfect molecular mirror asymmetry exhibited by the living organisms, a property known as "homochirality", is such a biosignature, because is a phenomenon only produced by life.
My research unites three strands of recent, significant astrophysical inquiry: high energy astrophysics, particle physics an astrobiology:
Astrobiology
- Spin-polarized muons and the origin of biological homochirality
- Polarized cosmic radiation as a chiral evolutionary pressure
- Cosmic shower calculations at different astrophysical environments
High energy astrophysics
- Relativistic jet formation, acceleration and collimation
- Physics of the central engine of relativistic jets
Multi-messenger particle physics
- Physics of cosmic rays accelerators
- Origin of ultrahigh energy cosmic-ray anisotropies
- Propagation of cosmic rays in Galactic and extragalactic magnetic fields
- Production of γ-rays, neutrinos from long and short GRBs (core-collapse supernovae and binary neutrons star merger)
Curriculum Vitae
Visiting positions and post-doctoral positions
2021 -- Chancellor's Postdoctoral Fellow, University of California, Santa Cruz
2019 -- Visiting scientist, Flatiron Institute (CCA), USA
2021 Postdoctoral researcher, ELI Beamlines (Czech Republic)
2019-2020 Postdoctoral researcher, New-York University (CCPP)
2012-2018 Postdoctoral researcher, Tel Aviv University and Hebrew University, Israel
2018-2019 Visiting postdoctoral researcher, Stanford University (KIPAC), USA
2019 (2 months) Visiting postdoctoral researcher, RIKEN, Tokyo, Japan
Selected Awards/Grants
2018-2019 Koret Fellowship (Stanford University)
2015-2017 Lady Davis Fellowship (The Hebrew University)
Publications
23 peer-reviewed papers, 16 as first author.
Invited news items in Nature, Quanta Magazine and Scientific American.
6 Peer-Reviewed Conference Proceedings
Teaching
2011-2012: Attache Temporaire d’Enseignement et de Recherche at Paris Observatory (96 hours in person)
2008-2011: Teaching assistant at Paris Observatory (192 hours in person)
2011-2012: Co-supervisor of M.Sc. students
2008-2011: Supervisor of observations for graduate students at Solar Tower of Meudon (spectrograph)
Subjects taught
- nuclear magnetic resonance (M.Sc.)
- special and general relativity (M.Sc.)
- solar optics and spectroscopy (M.Sc.)
- dynamics of dilute gases and plasmas (M.Sc.)
- imagery post-processing (M.Sc.)
- far-infrared detection (M.Sc.)
- astronomy and astrophysics (B.Sc.)
- programming in IDL (B.Sc.)
Outreach
2018 Public outreach activities at San Matteo College
2013-2014: Public outreach activities at Wise Observatory
2008-2011: Public outreach activities at Paris Observatory (open nights, outreach lectures, mentoring of astronomy projects in schools)
2002-2007: Co-founder of the association for Astronomy of Paris XI University
Misc
Languages: English, Polish (native), French (native), Hebrew (beginner).
Programming: Fortran, C, C++, IDL. 3D Visualization.
PhD students representative (the doctoral school of Astronomy and Astrophysics of Paris, academic year 2009-2010).
Junior member of the International Astronomical Union (IAU).
Professional Service Activities
Referee (ApJ, MNRAS, Science, JCAP, PRL, PRD, ACS earth & space chemistry)
Grant panelist for the French National Research Agency (ANR)
Grant panelist for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)
Organization of conferences/seminars
Organizer of the astrolunch (weekly seminar) at the Hebrew University (academic years 2016-2017 and 2017-2018).
Organizer of the High Energy Astrophysics Workshop (Feb. 28, 2017) at the Hebrew University.
SOC member, ”Rencontres du Vietnam: Very High Energy Phenomena in the Universe 2018”, ICISE, Quy Nhon (Vietnam).
Chair of the international conference: Nuclear Astrophysics & Cosmic Rays in the Multimessenger Era, ICISE, Quy Nhon (Vietnam)
Co-chair of the international conference: High Energy Astrophysics Israel Japan Workshop, RIKEN, Wako and Kobe Campus (Japan), July 18-23, 2019.
Observing experience
2011-2013: Observations at Telescope Bernard Lyot, Observatoire du Pic du Midi (21 nights). Referee: Dr R ́emi Cabanac. Instrument: NARVAL (spectropolarimeter)
2008: Training period (observations, data analysis) at the Observatoire de Haute Provence (1 week), France.
2006: Training period (observations, data analysis) at the Canada France Hawaii Telescope (3 weeks at the summit).
Referee: Dr Christian Veillet (Instrument: WIRCam)