research
My research is focused on cosmic magnetism, in particular the Galactic Magnetic Field (GMF). While this magnetic field is still poorly understood, it has a strong impact on numerous processes in the Galaxy, and affects how stars form and how the Galaxy evolves. Because it is not possible to travel around the Galaxy with a compass to directly measure the magnetic field we must resort to very indirect techniques to study the GMF. Currently, I work on combining several data sets in a thorough statistical analysis that can treat these disparate sets of data in a comprehensive and uniform framework.
I am also interested in Ultra-High Energy Cosmic Rays (UHECRs); the search for their astrophysical origin and their connection with the Galactic magnetic field. If the GMF is regular on large scales it can significantly deflect a charged UHECR, and hence obfuscate the true source direction of the cosmic ray. However, this also implies that if we know the true source direction we can extract information of the GMF from the measured arrival direction of the cosmic ray.
contact info
email: rj486 [at] nyu [dot] edu