The Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian

The Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian

Support Our Science

Jose-Dias Do Nascimento

Center for Astrophysics

Astrophysicist

Jose-Dias Do Nascimento

jdonascimento@cfa.harvard.edu

About

Jose-Dias is an astrophysicist working at the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian Observatory in the High Energy Division. Jose-Dias' research includes the analysis of spectroscopic and photometric time series from the ground and from space. Jose-Dias investigates the photometric and spectroscopic modulation induced by magnetic activity cycle(s) and the relationship between stellar rotation period and stellar magnetic cycle(s) in late-type FGKM stars, as well as its impacts on exoplanets. In addition, our observational work has contributed to the study of the angular momentum evolution of low-mass stars and to the characterization of solar analog stars using telescopes on the ground and in space.

Ph.D., Institut de Recherche en Astrophysique et Planétologie, Toulouse, France, 1999

Telescopes and Instruments

Giant Magellan Telescope

Is Earth unique, or are there other planets with life in the Milky Way? To answer this question and many others, astronomers need larger and more sensitive observatories than anything we currently have. For that reason, the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian is collaborating with a number of other institutions around the world to create the Giant Magellan Telescope (GMT), currently under construction in Chile. The GMT will consist of seven large mirrors acting in concert as one giant telescope 80 feet across. That large size provides an unprecedented view of the sky and the ability to detect the chemical composition of exoplanet atmospheres. Like NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, the GMT will be a powerful tool across the field of astronomy, providing insights into the formation of planets, the structure of galaxies, and the evolution of the universe itself.

Visit the GMT Website

Kepler/K2

Since the early 1990s, astronomers have identified thousands of planets orbiting other stars. Most of those identifications have come thanks to one observatory: NASA’s Kepler space telescope. Until it lost its ability to point, Kepler observed a region of the sky containing about 150,000 stars with potential planets, monitoring them for the slight decrease in light caused by planets crossing in front of the star. After the spacecraft’s pointing control failed, the mission was renamed K2, and it continued to hunt for exoplanets as it tumbled slowly, with its field of view drifting slowly across the sky. The mission finally ended in 2018, though the data it produced continues to provide astronomers with valuable information about planets in our galactic neighborhood. Astronomers from the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian were responsible for the preparation of the catalog for potentially interesting stars, and have participated extensively in follow-up observations of Kepler planetary discoveries.

Visit the Kepler/K2 Website

Chandra

The Chandra X-ray Observatory is NASA’s flagship X-ray observatory, providing essential data on everything from the environment surrounding newborn stars to the emissions from hot plasma inside galaxy clusters. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO), as part of the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian, manages Chandra’s day-to-day operations, providing spacecraft control, observation planning, and data processing for astronomers. Chandra is one of NASA’s orbiting Great Observatories, along with the Hubble.

Visit the Chandra Website

Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO)

The Sun is both life-giving and dangerous. Variations in the Sun’s light and wind have profound effects on Earth, while solar storms can wreak havoc on power and communications systems. NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) is a spacecraft dedicated to studying these potentially dangerous variations, and the magnetic fields that drive them. Engineers at the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian contributed to the design and construction of the four Atmospheric Imaging Array (AIA) telescopes. AIA is one of the three major experiments carried by SDO.

Visit the SDO Website

Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS)

Astronomers have discovered thousands of planets orbiting other stars. Extrapolating from that knowledge, the Milky Way alone is probably home to hundreds of billions of planets, many of which are likely rocky, Earth-like worlds. NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) is a space observatory designed to look for exoplanets in orbit around 200,000 nearby bright stars, with a particular interest in identifying small planets. Astronomers from the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian are part of the scientific team to analyze TESS data, as well as performing follow-up observations. The relative closeness of worlds in the TESS survey will allow astronomers to even study some of their atmospheres, using the future Giant Magellan Telescope (GMT) and other observatories. TESS observational program is complementary to NASA’s long-running Kepler/K2 mission, and could identify as many as 20,000 new exoplanet orbiting a wide variety of star types.

Visit the TESS Website