Ingrid Stairs

Ingrid Stairs
Stairs in 2019
Born
Canada
Alma materPrinceton University
Scientific career
FieldsPhysics (astrophysics)
InstitutionsUniversity of British Columbia
Academic advisorsJoseph Taylor

Ingrid Stairs is a Canadian astronomer currently based at the University of British Columbia. She studies pulsars and their companions as a way to study binary pulsar evolution, pulsar instrumentation and polarimetry, and Fast Radio Bursts (FRBs). She was awarded the 2017 Rutherford Memorial Medal for physics of the Royal Society of Canada,[1][2] and was elected as a Fellow of the American Physical Society in 2018.[3]

Education

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Stairs obtained her undergraduate Honors degree from McGill University in 1993, and obtained Masters and PhD degrees from Princeton University in 1995 and 1998 respectively. For her PhD research she worked with Professor Joe Taylor.[4]

Career

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From 1998 to 2000, Stairs was a postdoctoral fellow at the Jodrell Bank Observatory in the United Kingdom. From 2000 to 2002 she was a research associate at NRAO in Green Bank, West Virginia. In 2002 she became an assistant professor at the University of British Columbia where she has been ever since, becoming an associate professor in 2007 and a full professor in 2012.[4]

Research

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Stairs works on various topics related to the science of extreme gravitational objects. She uses large scale pulsar searches with both the Arecibo Telescope and Green Bank Telescope to study pulsar populations and their evolution, find new millisecond pulsars and exotic binary systems. She has helped assembled coherent dedispersion instruments for Arecibo and Green Bank. She times millisecond pulsars as a member of the NANOGrav experiment.[5]

In addition to finding these pulsars, she uses long term pulsar timing to study the orbital dynamics of pulsar systems, such as and interaction between the two stars in the system.[6] She has extensively studied relativistic binary systems like B1534+12,[7][8] J1906+0746,[9] and the double pulsar J0737-3039A/B.[10][11] She also tracks some young pulsars, such as J1740-3502,[12] which has a massive binary companion, and  PSR 1828-11 which undergoes correlated timing and magnetospheric changes.[13][14]

Stairs is part of the CHIME FRB and pulsar collaborations.[15][16] CHIME is currently operational and has released many new FRB candidates[17] including new repeating FRB candidates.[17][18] Stairs was responsible for managing the installation of the CHIME pulsar instrument.

Honours and awards

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References

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  1. ^ "Past award winners". Royal Society of Canada. 21 October 2018. Retrieved 24 October 2019.
  2. ^ White, Jacob. "Ground breaking work on pulsars earns UBC astrophysicist prestigious prize". The Ubyssey. Retrieved 2019-10-25.
  3. ^ a b "Dr. Ingrid Stairs elected Fellow of American Physical Society | UBC Physics & Astronomy". www.phas.ubc.ca. Retrieved 2019-10-24.
  4. ^ a b "istairs". www.phas.ubc.ca. Retrieved 2019-10-24.
  5. ^ Arzoumanian, Zaven; Brazier, Adam; Burke-Spolaor, Sarah; Chamberlin, Sydney; Chatterjee, Shami; Christy, Brian; Cordes, James M.; Cornish, Neil J.; Crawford, Fronefield; Cromartie, H. Thankful; Crowter, Kathryn (2018-04-09). "The NANOGrav 11-year Data Set: High-precision timing of 45 Millisecond Pulsars". The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series. 235 (2): 37. arXiv:1801.01837. Bibcode:2018ApJS..235...37A. doi:10.3847/1538-4365/aab5b0. ISSN 1538-4365.
  6. ^ White, Jacob. "Ground breaking work on pulsars earns UBC astrophysicist prestigious prize". The Ubyssey. Retrieved 2019-10-24.
  7. ^ Stairs, I. H.; Thorsett, S. E.; Arzoumanian, Z. (September 2004). "Measurement of Gravitational Spin-Orbit Coupling in a Binary-Pulsar System". Physical Review Letters. 93 (14): 141101. arXiv:astro-ph/0408457. Bibcode:2004PhRvL..93n1101S. doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.93.141101. hdl:2060/20040171632. PMID 15524779.
  8. ^ Fonseca, Emmanuel; Stairs, Ingrid H.; Thorsett, Stephen E. (May 2014). "A Comprehensive Study of Relativistic Gravity Using PSR B1534+12". The Astrophysical Journal. 787 (1): 82. arXiv:1402.4836. Bibcode:2014ApJ...787...82F. doi:10.1088/0004-637X/787/1/82.
  9. ^ van Leeuwen, J.; Kasian, L.; Stairs, I. H.; Lorimer, D. R.; Camilo, F.; Chatterjee, S.; Cognard, I.; Desvignes, G.; Freire, P. C. C.; Janssen, G. H.; Kramer, M. (January 2015). "The Binary Companion of Young, Relativistic Pulsar J1906+0746". The Astrophysical Journal. 798 (2): 118. arXiv:1411.1518. Bibcode:2015ApJ...798..118V. doi:10.1088/0004-637X/798/2/118.
  10. ^ Stairs, Ingrid H. (September 2003). "Testing General Relativity with Pulsar Timing". Living Reviews in Relativity. 6 (1): 5. arXiv:astro-ph/0307536. Bibcode:2003LRR.....6....5S. doi:10.12942/lrr-2003-5. PMC 5253800. PMID 28163640.
  11. ^ Kramer, M.; Stairs, I. H.; Manchester, R. N.; McLaughlin, M. A.; Lyne, A. G.; Ferdman, R. D.; Burgay, M.; Lorimer, D. R.; Possenti, A.; D'Amico, N.; Sarkissian, J. M. (October 2006). "Tests of General Relativity from Timing the Double Pulsar". Science. 314 (5796): 97–102. arXiv:astro-ph/0609417. Bibcode:2006Sci...314...97K. doi:10.1126/science.1132305. PMID 16973838.
  12. ^ Madsen, E. C.; Stairs, I. H.; Kramer, M.; Camilo, F.; Hobbs, G. B.; Janssen, G. H.; Lyne, A. G.; Manchester, R. N.; Possenti, A.; Stappers, B. W. (September 2012). "Timing the main-sequence-star binary pulsar J1740-3052". Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 425 (3): 2378. arXiv:1207.2202. Bibcode:2012MNRAS.425.2378M. doi:10.1111/j.1365-2966.2012.21691.x.
  13. ^ Stairs, I. H.; Athanasiadis, D.; Kramer, M.; Lyne, A. G. (2002-10-31). "High-Resolution Observations of PSR B1828-11". Radio Pulsars. 302: 249. arXiv:astro-ph/0211005. Bibcode:2003ASPC..302..249S.
  14. ^ Stairs, I. H.; Lyne, A. G.; Kramer, M.; Stappers, B. W.; van Leeuwen, J.; Tung, A.; Manchester, R. N.; Hobbs, G. B.; Lorimer, D. R.; Melatos, A. (May 2019). "Mode switching and oscillations in PSR B1828-11". Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 485 (3): 3230. arXiv:1903.01573. Bibcode:2019MNRAS.485.3230S. doi:10.1093/mnras/stz647.
  15. ^ "CHIME telescope detects second-ever repeating fast radio burst | UBC Physics & Astronomy". www.phas.ubc.ca. Retrieved 2019-10-24.
  16. ^ "UBC radio telescope picks up powerful, repeating energy burst from beyond the Milky Way". Global News. Retrieved 2019-10-24.
  17. ^ a b Amiri, M.; Bandura, K.; Bhardwaj, M.; Boubel, P.; Boyce, M. M.; Boyle, P. J.; Brar, C.; Burhanpurkar, M.; Chawla, P.; Cliche, J. F.; Cubranic, D. (February 2019). "Observations of fast radio bursts at frequencies down to 400 megahertz". Nature. 566 (7743): 230–234. arXiv:1901.04524. Bibcode:2019Natur.566..230C. doi:10.1038/s41586-018-0867-7. ISSN 1476-4687. PMID 30653191.
  18. ^ Briggs, Helen (2019-01-09). "Mysterious radio signals from deep space". Retrieved 2019-10-24.
  19. ^ "Past Award Winners | The Royal Society of Canada". rsc-src.ca. 21 October 2018. Retrieved 2019-10-24.
  20. ^ "Martin Award - CASCA". Retrieved 2019-10-24.
  21. ^ "Past & Present Postdocs — Science Website". science.nrao.edu. Retrieved 2019-10-24.
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