Experience and Education
My 15 year career in the study of the production, control, and analysis of photons has seen me move from Texas to Bayern. I obtained a bachelors of science degree in Physics at Texas A&M University in College Station,
and a doctorate in Astronomy at the University of Texas at Austin. After successfully defending my thesis on star formation and silicon diffractive optics, I took a
postdoctoral position at the Max Planck Institut für Astronomie in Heidelberg, working on CIAO, a suite of four infrared adaptive optics instruments to be installed on the European Southern
Observatory's (ESO) Very Large Telescope (VLT). After the delivery and installation of the wave front sensors, I moved from MPIA in Heidelberg to the Max Planck Institut für
extraterrestrische Physik in Garching bei München, where I ended my tour through Academia as the CIAO responsible for the GRAVITY Interferometer.
I left Academia in 2018 for Mynaric Lasercom GmbH, where I am currently the Lead Optical Test Engineer for our suite of airborne and satellite laser communication terminals.
Mynaric Lasercom GmbH
Responsible for coordinating the work of the Optical Testing group, including designing, preparing, and performing optical tests for terminals and subsystems at various stages of the development and production lifecycle for both internal and external customers.
MPI für extraterrestrische Physik
Adaptive Optics (AO) specialist. Responsible for ensuring Adaptive Optics performance during operation with GRAVITY Interferometer, and diagnosing/solving performance problems. Embedded Strehl ratio measurement routine in GRAVITY reduction pipeline.
MPI for Astronomie
MAIT Engineer for Coudé Infrared Adaptive Optics (CIAO). Aided construction and of optical test bench. Tested optical, mechanical, and electrical components of the AO system prior to integration. Tuned AO system to optimize correction bandwidth under various observing conditions. Developed instrument software to standards defined by the European Southern Observatory (ESO), developed data reduction pipeline for use in alignment, commissioning, and health-verification of CIAO instrument at Telescope
Univ. of Texas, Dept. of Astronomy
Thesis topic: “The Relationship between Disk and Stellar Properties of Young Stellar Objects”. Responsible for metrology (transmission, AR coating, cryogenic robustness, blaze function, PSF) of silicon diffractive optics (grisms, immersion gratings) produced by Dr. Jaffe’s group. Involved in the development and improvement of next-generation lithographic UV exposure system for the production of larger and better grisms and immersion gratings for future astronomical instruments.
Texas A&M University
I worked in the laboratory of Prof. Dr. Donald Naugle on cryogenic thin films studying superconductivity in condensed matter. I also worked in the laboratory of magnet fabrication laboratory of Prof. Dr. Peter McIntyre helping to construct magnets for CERN.