The Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian

The Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian

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Lindy Blackburn

Center for Astrophysics

Radio Astronomer & EHT Data Scientist

Lindy Blackburn

lblackburn@cfa.harvard.edu

About

Lindy Blackburn is a Radio Astronomer and EHT Data Scientist at the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian. He works on data statistics and calibration for the Event Horizon Telescope, toward the goal of obtaining high-resolution images of supermassive black holes. Lindy obtained a PhD in physics from MIT while working on the LIGO experiment, and was a NASA postdoctoral program fellow at Goddard Space Flight Center, working on searches for high-energy counterparts to gravitational-wave detections with the Fermi telescope. He has a general interest in black-holes, experimental general relativity, and the application of statistical methods and modeling for precision measurement.

PhD Physics, MIT 2010

Telescopes and Instruments

Event Horizon Telescope (EHT)

Black holes are found in the centers of most galaxies, where they can influence star formation and the distribution of atoms in the environment surrounding them. However, direct observation of a black hole is difficult because it is so small relative to their masses. Founded by Shep Doeleman at the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian, the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) captured the first image ever taken of a black hole: specifically, the ring of light produced by matter just as it falls into the black hole at the center of the nearby galaxy M87. The EHT is a virtual observatory consisting of telescopes spanning the planet, from Greenland to the South Pole. The international collaboration operating the EHT includes observatories affiliated with the Center for Astrophysics: the CfA’s Submillimeter Array (SMA) and the Greenland Telescope.

Visit the EHT Website

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

The Submillimeter Array - Maunakea, HI

Located near the summit of Maunakea on the Big Island of Hawaii, the Submillimeter Array (SMA) is one of the flagship observatories of the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian. The observatory consists of eight radio dishes working together as one telescope, giving astronomers a window on a wide range of astronomical objects and phenomena: planets and comets in our own Solar System; the birth of stars and planets; and the supermassive black holes hidden at the centers of the Milky Way and other galaxies. The SMA is operated jointly by the CfA and the Academia Sinica in Taiwan.

Visit the Submillimeter Array Website