Welcome

Hello! I am currently a Support Astronomer at Lick Observatory.

I was previously the Lab/Observatory Manager at NMSU. I supported the Astronomy department with the undergraduate labs, and supported operations, maintenance, and troubleshooting at the campus observatory and Tortugas Mountain Observatory. I was also responsible for support of the IT infrastructure in the Astronomy department.

I was a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Center for Astrophysics and Space Sciences (CASS) at the University of California, San Diego. I worked with Adam Burgasser to characterise and model the low-mass population in Omega Centauri, a massive globular cluster which shows signs of multiple populations. I was previously a postdoc at Steward Observatory, at the University of Arizona with Daniel Apai

I received my Ph.D. in 2016 from the University of Exeter, working under the supervision of Tim Naylor. My thesis was focussed on deriving robust ages for young stars, in particular low-mass and low-stellar-density regions like Taurus and Chamaeleon. A copy of my thesis is available here

I previously completed my M.Phys. (Hons.) degree in Astrophysics at Cardiff University, working with Haley Gomez.

Contact Details

UCO/Lick Observatory
7281 Mount Hamilton Road
Mount Hamilton, CA
95140
USA

Email: jrees "at" ucolick.org

Research Interests

My research is primarily focussed on the application of stellar evolutionary models to low-mass stars, young clusters and star-forming regions to determine ages and other stellar properties. My scientific interests can broadly be summed up as:

  • The origin of multiple populations in old globular clusters.
  • Robust age determinations for young clusters.
  • The effect of environment on circumstellar discs.
  • Stellar evolutionary models.
  • The initial mass function.