All News & Updates Posts
Paper on the Discovery of the Hot Jupiter Orbiting the Rapid Rotator TOI-778
10 May 2023 - I heavily contributed to the paper on the discovery of the hot Jupiter TOI-778b that orbits a rapidly rotating star. The papers can be found here. I did an interview with 7News Toowoomba on the discovery of this planet, which can be accessed here.
Started New Postdoc Position at Swinburne
07 November 2022 - I have just moved to Swinburne University of Technology as a Postdoctoral Research Associate working with Prof. Michael Murphy on a project to measure variations in the fine structure constant α using high-resolution spectra of giant stars.
Discovery of the Second Hottest Ultrahot Jupiter & Measurement of its Orbital Obliquity & Atmosphere!
01 December 2021 - I led the effort on the discovery of the ultrahot Jupiter TOI-1431b/MASCARA-5b, a planet with the second hottest nightside temperature of ~2600K! Additionally, I contributed to measurements of the planet's orbital obliquity and atmosphere. The papers can be found here and here. An animation I created of TOI-1431b using Universe Sandbox can be found here.
Measured the Orbital Obliquity of AU Mic b, the Youngest Planet to have such a Measurement!
01 October 2021 - I led the effort to measure the spin-orbit alignment of the youngest planet ever! This planet is AU Mic b, a ~20Myr Neptune-sized planet. The paper can be found here. A 7News Toowoomba piece on this planet's discovery can be found here.
Paper on the Aligned Orbit of an Eccentric Warm Jupiter K2-232b
01 August 2021 - A paper on the measurement of the orbital obliquity of an eccentric warm Jupiter, K2-232b, a planet that belongs to relatively sparsly sampled population of measured spin-orbit angles. The paper can be found here.
My First Exoplanet Discovery Led Paper on TOI-257b, A Warm Sub-Saturn Planet!
01 December 2020 - A paper I led on the discovery of the transiting exoplanet TOI-257b using the Minerva-Australis telescope! The planet was initially detected by TESS and I led the effort to confirm the planet candidate using Minerva-Australis radial velocities. The paper can be found here. I also gave a short 15 minute presentation uploaded on YouTube on the discovery of this planet as well as exoplanetary science in general, provided here. 7News Toowoomba interviewed me on the discovery of this planet and can be found here.
Minerva-Australis Commissioning Paper
01 November 2019 - A paper all about the design, commissioning, and first photometric results from the Minerva-Australis telescope array used to discover exoplanets! The paper can be found here.
Transiting Hot Jupiter and a Cold Massive Giant Planet Found by HATSouth Around a Sun-like Star
15 November 2018 - Co-author on another HATSouth planet discovery paper. This paper reports on the discovery of HATS-59b,c: A Transiting Hot Jupiter and a Cold Massive Giant Planet around a Sun-like Star. The papers can be found here.
Stellar Obliquities and Planetary Alignments (SOPA) Paper Published
01 November 2018 - Paper published on a project I started on measuring spin-orbit angles of planetary systems. Included in the paper are spin-orbit alignment measurements of three Jovian planets (WASP-72b, WASP-100b, and WASP-109b), two of which are highly misaligned (WASP-100b and WASP-109b)! The papers can be found here.
First Hot Jupiter Discovered by TESS, HD 202772Ab!
15 October 2018 - Co-author on paper with the first confirmation of a hot Jupiter discovered by TESS known as HD 202772Ab! The papers can be found here.
Ten Transiting Planets From HATSouth
15 September 2018 - Co-author on paper with 10 new planet discoveries from the HATSouth transiting planet survey. The papers can be found here.
Started New Postdoc Position at University of Southern Queensland
13 August 2018 - I have just started a postdoctoral Research Fellow in Astrophysics position at the University of Southern Queensland to find and characterise new exoplanets using the Minerva-Australis Telescope array with Prof. Rob Wittenymer.
Paper on Spin-orbit Alignments for Three Transiting Hot Jupiters Submitted Soon!
24 January 2018 - I will be submitting a paper in the next couple weeks on the spin-orbit angles of three Jovian planets, two of which are highly misaligned! Keep an eye out for it.
Papers on Relocating the Kepler-9b Transit & Measuring the Spin–Orbit Angle for Kepler-9
24 January 2018 - Co-author on two papers involving the Kepler-9 multiplanet system. The first paper we relocated the Kepler-9b transit and the second paper we measured the spin-orbit angle for Kepler-9b using HIRES RV measurements on Keck. The papers can be found here and here, repectively.
Paper on Spin-Orbit Misalignments of Three Jovian Planets via Doppler Tomography
08 October 2017 - Co-author on paper measuring the spin-orbit alignments of three Jovian planets using the Doppler tomography technique that's published in AJ. The paper can be found here.
Paper on Spin-orbit Alignment for Three Transiting Hot Jupiters: WASP-103b, WASP-87b, and WASP-66b
12 May 2016 - Paper on measuring the spin-orbit alignments of WASP-103b, WASP-87b, and WASP-66b has now been accepted and published in ApJ. The arXiv paper can be viewed here or the published ApJ version can be obtained here.
Started Postdoc Position at Mississippi State University
16 December 2015 - I have just started a postdoctoral position at Mississippi State University to work on developing the Starchive Open Access Stellar and Planetary Database with Dr. Angelle Tanner.
PhD Thesis Has Been Accepted! I Now Have My PhD!
08 April 2015 - I now officially have my PhD in astrophysics. My thesis is titled: 'Measuring the Spin-Orbit Alignments of Extrasolar Planets'. It will appear on arXiv soon.
Paper on the Spin-Orbit Alignments of Two Planetary Systems Submitted to ApJ
05 April 2015 - Paper on the measurements of the spin-orbit alignments of two Hot Jupiters systems has been submitted to ApJ. Watch out for it.
PhD Thesis Submitted!
27 September 2014 - I have just recently submitted my PhD thesis on 'Measuring the Spin-Orbit Alignments of Extrasolar Planets'.
Awarded 2 Nights on Magellan MagAO to Continue Stellar Companion Survey
27 September 2014 - Graeme Salter, Brett Addison, Chris Tinney, and Laird Close have been awarded 2 nights on the Magellan Telescope using the MagAO adaptive optics system in Chile for 'Determining the Origin of Spin-Orbit Misaligned Hot Jupiter Systems' coming up in November. Our team will continue the search for stellar companions around Hot-Jupiter systems to determine if they are the primary cause of the observed spin-orbit misalignments.
Results from the Search for Stellar Companions Around Hot Jupiters using MagAO Coming Soon
27 September 2014 - Paper on the results from the search for stellar companions around Hot Jupiter systems with measured spin-orbit angles is coming soon. Keep a watch out for it.
A Spin-Orbit Alignment for the Hot Jupiter HATS-3b
27 September 2014 - Paper on spin-orbit alignment of HATS-3b has now been accepted and published in ApJ. The arXiv paper can be viewed here or the published ApJ version can be obtained here.
New Spin-Orbit Alignment Paper Coming Soon
08 March 2014 - Paper on spin-orbit alignment of another Hot Jupiter coming soon. Keep a watch out for it.
08 March 2014 - A conference proceedings paper that I recently wrote will be published in the peer-reviewed proceedings of the 13th annual Australian Space Science Conference. The paper is about the recently published polar orbit of WASP-79b, the various mechanisms producing Hot Jupiters with high obliquities, and testing the Kozai mechanism by searching for stellar companions associated with misaligned Hot Jupiter systems here.
27 November 2013 - Graeme Salter, Brett Addison, Chris Tinney, and Laird Close have been awarded 1 night on the Magellan Telescope in Chile for 'Determining the Origin of Spin-Orbit Misaligned Hot Jupiter Systems'. Our team will search for stellar companions around Hot-Jupiter systems to determine if they are the primary cause of spin-orbit misalignments.
23 August 2013 - Australian national broadcaster Stuart Gary of ABC Science interviewed me on my recently published result for the polar orbit of WASP-79b. Check out the written article here or audio broadcast here.
2 August 2013 - My paper has been accepted in ApJ Letters and the final version will be available soon after publication in ApJ Letters.
8 June 2013 - Our group has measured the Rossiter-McLaughlin effect for WASP-79 and determined it is in a nearly polar orbit. Check out the paper here.
5 June 2013 - A paper on the 3rd planet discovered by the HATSouth group. Check out the paper here.
8 April 2013 - Second planet discovered by the HATSouth team has now been published. Check out the paper here.
31 January 2013 - The first planet the HATSouth team has detected is now published in the Astronomical Journal. Many more planets await to be discovered by the HATSouth global network of ground-based telescopes searching for transiting planets. The paper can be accessed from here.