Current Jansky Fellows

2026

2026 Jansky Postdoctoral Fellowship Awards: Announcement

Ryan Boyden (NRAO/Charlottesville) received his PhD in 2023 from the University of Arizona, after which he became a Virginia Initiative on Cosmic Origins (VICO) Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. Ryan's research focuses on analyses of the relationship between planet formation and star formation, especially in clustered star-forming environments. He exploits observations from the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), the NSF Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA), and the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) for his studies  As a Jansky Fellow, Ryan will lead as Principal Investigator a series of newly approved ALMA, VLA, and JWST programs to constrain the environmental influence on planet formation, including pioneering novel analysis methods in using radio recombination lines to measure gas kinematics.

Alexandr Plavin (NRAO/Socorro) graduated with Ph.D. in Physics and Astronomy at the Lebedev Physical Institute, Moscow in 2022. For his first postdoctoral appointment Sasha was a Black Hole Initiative Postdoctoral Fellow at Harvard University, where he focused on studying quasar jets and black hole environments at the range of wavebands, from radio interferometry and the Event Horizon Telescope to high-energies (neutrinos). As a Jansky Fellow, Sasha will tackle a long-standing puzzle in high-energy astrophysics: how quasars — the most powerful engines in the Universe — accelerate particles to extreme energies. He will pair the NSF Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA) radio imaging of quasar jets with detections of cosmic neutrinos, building on his discovery that the brightest radio jets and the highest-energy neutrinos share a common origin.

Jacob Turner (Cornell) received his Ph.D in physics from the West Virginia University in 2023, and since he has been a postdoctoral fellow at Green Bank Observatory. He is the leader of the Pulsar Science Collaboratory (PSC) scintillation group, acting as a research mentor for students, ranging from middle to graduate school, helping them learn how to observe, process, analyze, and interpret pulsar data. His work at Green Bank has been primarily focused on cyclic spectroscopy, for which he has been an instrumental force in the development and testing of this unique backend system. As an external Jansky Fellow at Cornell University, Jacob will expand the field of pulsar cyclic spectroscopy through demonstrations of the technique’s capabilities using the GBT’s new cyclic spectroscopy backend, as well as commission similar systems for instruments like the Deep Synoptic Arrays.

2025

2025 Jansky Postdoctoral Fellowship Awards: Announcement

Michael P. Busch (NRAO/Charlottesville) graduated with his PhD in physics at The Johns Hopkins University in 2022, after which he became a NSF Astronomy and Postdoctoral Fellow at University of California, San Diego. Michael's research focuses on studies of molecular astrophysics, galactic structure and the interstellar medium. As a Jansky Fellow Michael is excited to work on the new ALPACA phased-array-feed on the NSF Green Bank Telescope (GBT), which will allow for large-scale mapping of faint signals such as extremely diffuse hydrogen and OH in diffuse molecular gas. He will continue working on our understanding of how much molecular gas is available to form stars in galaxies using the Atacama Large Millimeter/sub-millimeter Array (ALMA) and the NSF GBT and Very Large Array telescopes. 

Zhe-Yu Daniel Lin (NRAO/Charlottesville) graduated with a PhD in astronomy at the University of Virginia, USA, in 2024. Before joining NRAO he was a postdoctoral fellow at the Earth & Planets Laboratory of Carnegie Science in Washington, D.C. In his research Daniel aims to understand planet formation and the evolution of planetary systems. He utilizes polarization observations of the planetary disks from the Atacama Large Millimeter/sub-millimeter Array (ALMA) and the NSF Very Large Array to inspect grain growth and grain alignment mechanisms, and tests possible models by employing advanced numerical techniques, including Monte Carlo radiation transfer, discrete dipole approximation, and machine learning, to maximize insights from data. As a Jansky Fellow Daniel will be developing novel applications of high angular resolution polarization in disks.

Kathryn Plant (NRAO/Socorro) graduated with PhD at Caltech in 2022. Before arriving to NRAO she was a NASA Postdoctoral Program fellow at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Throughout her education and career Kathryn has been particularly interested in astronomical instrumentation; she built a fast digital signal processing system to observe high energy cosmic rays with the Owens Valley Radio Observatory Long Wavelength Array (LWA), and worked on an upgrade to the Molonglo Observatory Synthesis Telescope (MOST) in Australia. As a Jansky Fellow Kathryn will use her LWA instrument to. search for high energy cosmic rays, she is also excited to undertake a multi-wavelength, multi-messenger investigation into Milky Way particle accelerators.

2024

2024 Jansky Postdoctoral Fellowship Awards: Announcement

Kyle Massingill (NRAO/Albuquerque) graduated with PhD in astrophysics at Arizona State University in 2024. Kyle's research focuses on millimeter-wave filter-bank design, simulation, and testing, and integrating it into novel weather sensors on high-altitude balloons. Kyle's scientific interests include high redshift galaxies and quasars observed with ALMA, and how their feedback could be regulating galaxy evolution. Previously he has also worked on the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT). As a Jansky fellow, at NRAO in Socorro, New Mexico, Kyle will use his interdisciplinary experience to contribute to calibration strategies for ngVLA and further his scientific research into quasars.

Fenqui Adam Dong (GBO) concluded his Jansky Fellowship appointment in 2026, and taken up a Canadian SKA Fellowship at the York University, Canada.

2023

2023 Jansky Postdoctoral Fellowship Awards: Announcement

Cosima Eibensteiner (NRAO/Charlottesville) graduated from the University of Bonn in Germany in 2023 a Ph.D in Astronomy. Cosima’s research interests include the structure, evolution, chemistry and kinematics of the interstellar medium (ISM), from large scale disk properties to central molecular zones in nearby galaxies. Her thesis, which utilized data from NSF’s Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA), the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), NSF’s Green Bank Telescope (GBT), MeerKAT and IRAM, focused on disentangling the physical and chemical processes that shape and govern the ISM. As a member of the PHANGS collaboration, Cosima is studying stellar nurseries in nearby disk galaxies. As a Jansky Fellow at NRAO in Charlottesville, Virginia, Cosima is expanding her research into the effects of the ISM on star formation processes.

Samantha Scibelli (NRAO/Charlottesville) has concluded her Jansky Fellowship appointment in 2026, and became NASA  Sagan Fellow based at NRAO in Charlottesville.

Hendrik Mueller (NRAO/Socorro) concluded his Jansky Fellowship appointment in 2026, after which he became NRAO Assistant Scientist based at NRAO/Socorro.