I am an expert radio astronomer. I am the SKA Lecturer at the University of Cape Town.
Contact
Location
Cape Town, Western Cape 7000 SA
Work
South African Radio Astronomical Observatory
Senior Developer
The South African Radio Astronomical Observatory (SARAO) currently operates the Hartebeeshoek Radio Astronomical Observatory, is building and will operate the MeerKAT telescope and will play a leading role in building the SKA mid-frequency array that will be built in South Africa.
Department of Astronomy, University of Cape Town
SKA Lecturer
The Department of Astronomy (UCT) is a globally recognised centre for astronomical research. Is the home to NRF Research Chairs, the head node for the National Astrophysics and Space Science Programme, is a leading institution in MeerKAT Large Survey Projects. Is also a host and a leading partner for the Inter-University Institute for Data Intensive Astronomy.
- Project Scientist for the African Research Cloud Astronomy Demonstrator Project (ARCADE) and the IDIA/SKA-SA/IBM-Dome/ASTRON Pathfinder Science Regional Data Centre.
- Implemented the first cloud focused teaching and learning intervention at UCT (second- year astronomical techniques).
- Project Lead for the Pipelines Project at IDIA, coordinating an international team of scientific and technical experts in radio interferometry.
- Member of the imaging Large Science Projects planned with MeerKAT, in addition to programmes with several other telescopes.
- Lecturer for Data Science for Astronomers (M.Sc. in Data Science).
- Supervises MSc. and Honours Students.
ASTRON
Postdoctoral Research Fellow
One of the oldest and most prestigious centres for radio astronomy in the world, has a core focus of developing technologies for the next generation of radio telescopes. Operates the LOFAR and APERTIF telescopes.
- A member of the RadioLife science team studying radio galaxies, investigating the complex relationship between the lifecycle of the central black hole and the evolution of the parent galaxy.
- Characterised performance bottlenecks through efficient, lightweight benchmarking of astronomical software.
- Lead author for the specification of the APERTIF pipeline, which formed part of the successful critical design review.
- Lead designer and developer (Python) of the APERCAL software — the main software package being used for APERTIF.
Education
University of Cape Town
University of the Witwatersrand
University of the Witwatersrand
Awards
Frank Nabarro Memorial Prize
Faculty of Science
Highest Mark for 3rd year Project
Publications
A rare example of low surface- brightness radio lobes in a gas-rich early-type galaxy: The story of NGC 3998
Published by Astronomy & Astrophysics
A deep survey of NGC3998 reveals a complex picture of galaxies intertwined in mergers, interactions and triggering. The massive-early type galaxy NGC3998 has a large amount of HI and hosts a low-luminosity AGN with faint S-shaped radio lobes. We try to reconstruct the evolutionary history of this galaxy and its neighbours, linking the peculiar morphology of the low-power radio jets to the ongoing interactions in the group.
Impact of Molecular Gas in Mass Models of Nearby Galaxies
Published by The Astronomical Journal
We studied the dark matter content in a sample of nearby galaxies. In particular, we used the HERACLES survey to model the contribution of the molecular gas using different conversion factors. This work is the first comprehensive study that includes molecular gas in the high-resolution study of dynamics in galaxies.
Engineering and Science Highlights of the KAT-7 Radio Telescope
Published by Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
The Karoo Array Telescope (KAT-7) telescope was the first radio interferometer in Africa, and was a pathfinder for the MeerKAT telescope. We learned many important technical and engineering lessons during the building, commissioning and operation of KAT-7, but also produced some exciting and interesting science results. This paper provides a highlight of the technical and astronomical achievements of this telescope.
KAT-7 Science Verification: Using HI Observations of NGC 3109 to Understand Its Kinematics and Mass Distribution
Published by The Astronomical Journal
We used the KAT-7 telescope’s excellent low surface-brightness sensitivity to map the neutral hydrogen content in the nearby galaxy NGC3109, and we present a high spectral resolution dark matter model.
Significance of periodogram peaks and a pulsation mode analysis of the Beta Cephei star V403 Car
Published by Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
The periodogram is an essential and powerful tool in the arsenal of the stellar astrophysicist, and provides a way to study the variability of a star using unevenly sampled photometric time-series. In this work we present a method to estimate the statistical significance of peaks in the periodogram spectrum.