I am primarily interested in high-energy astrophysics. I am
currently researching Blazars, a type of Active Galactic Nuclei (
AGN)
that emits a high energy jet nearly straight at Earth. Their
radiation, which is prominent across the entire electromagnetic
spectrum, exhibits violent variability in brightness. Bright `knots'
appear to move at superluminal speeds down the jets, an illusion caused
by the jet orientation combined with near-light flow speeds.
Supermassive black holes are thought to be the `central engines' that
produce the jets.
Using Very Long Baseline Interferometry (
VLBI),
a technique that combines radio antennas to create an effective
Earth-sized telescope, I will make high resolution images of Blazars to
study jet structure and the source of photons that get inverse-Compton
scattered up to gamma-rays by electrons in the jet.
Publications
ADS-Search
Google
Scholar Profile
Co-Author Papers
"Gamma-Ray Energies in the Decay of 38Cl," K.S. Krane,
M.L.
Keck, E.B. Norman, and A.P. Shivprasad, Applied Radiation and
Isotopes, (2011),
doi:10.1016/j.apradiso.2011.12.033