Areas of supervision and research
We work with some of the world's largest interferometers to measure some of the Universe's faintest signals, using sound analysis to perform statistical reconstruction of the birth of the first stars.
We are working on making the first direct detection of the Epoch of Reionisation, which occurred roughly 1 billion years into the age of the Universe. Measuring this time period will be as impactful as the mapping of the Cosmic Microwave Background and will contribute to both astrophysical and cosmological understanding. However, it is a difficult experiment to perform – the hyperfine transition of neutral Hydrogen in the intergalactic medium is as faint as a lightbulb on Pluto surrounded by the lights of a fully lit stadium.
This measurement sits at the intersection of astrophysics, cosmology, engineering, computation, and statistics. As such, this is an atypical astronomy project, and really requires a love of learning all science directions. The skills that can be acquired with this project are directly related to big data, supercomputing, faint statistical reconstruction, and computation.
Please visit nicholebarry.com for more information and a list of current PhD projects.