An absolutely great PhD defense today by Emily Sandford (Columbia), who has worked on planet transits and what can be learned therefrom. And so wide-ranging: She worked on what you learn about a star from a single transit, what you learn about an orbit from a single transit, what you learn about the shape of the transiter, and even what you learn about the population of planetary systems from the statistics of the transits. The discussion was excellent and enlightening. One thing I loved was a little discussion about what it would mean to think of zero-planet systems as planetary systems. And lots about the representation of multi-planet systems (where Sandford has a grammar or natural-language-like approach).
I loved the defense so much, in part because Sandford crushed it and in part because I generally love PhD defenses: They remind me of all the reasons that I love my job. I was reflecting afterwards that the PhD is a kind of model of education: It is student-centered, it is customized and personalized for every student, it is self-directed, it is constructive, and it is success-oriented. And it produces some amazing scientists, including the brand-new Dr Sandford.
No comments:
Post a Comment