A year into my research and I’m slowly uncovering a lot about the zoo that populates objects under the title “Active Galactic Nuclei” (AGN). The fact that they are multi-wavelength emitters means that we get a variety of features to try and understand across different energy bands, but that also means that categories and sub-categories have become increasingly complex to describe them. The most straightforward standard model includes the central black hole, an accretion disk, a jet, an obscuring torus, and ionized clouds of gas near the black hole (broad/narrow line region; AGN model shown in Figure 1). Around the 1990s, a unification scheme for the numerous features of AGN…
Read More >>Reflections on Research, for scientists and non-scientists alike
My name is Ruby, and I’m a new member of Sera’s research group as a master’s student, analyzing a catalogue of low-luminosity active galactic nuclei. As a second year, I am now working on research full-time, for the first time in my academic career, and so have been considering the role that it has in shaping people when they leave the classroom. I’ve been told that it involves a lot of creativity, being able to stretch your mind outward around unrefined and unheard of problems, and I’ve been reflecting on the transition that comes from student to researcher, or more broadly, how it can affect the way you think and…
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