Profile
Prof Sasha Hinkley
Associate Professor
Telephone: 01392 725522
Extension: (Streatham) 5522
Overview:I'm an experimental astrophysicist interested in high contrast imaging and spectroscopy of exoplanetary systems. Specifically, for my PhD at Columbia University, and while a Sagan and an NSF Fellow at the California Institute of Technology, I led the development of an infrared imaging spectrometer for Palomar Observatory dedicated for this task. Since my arrival at Exeter, I have become an active user of ESO facilities, while continuing to mine through my large direct imaging survey for planets I carried out at the W. M. Keck Observatory while at Caltech. I am also the Principal Investigator for an approved 54-hour Early Release Science Program with the James Webb Space Telescope, working with Andy Skemer (UCSC) and Beth Biller (Edinburgh) as well as numerous other astronomers across the world.
Students:
- My first PhD student Elisabeth Matthews, now a postdoc at MIT, led our survey for planets around young stars with evidence for multiple belts of circumstellar debris using SPHERE at the VLT. Elisabeth's work uncovered a spectacular image of a nearly edge-on disk around the star HD 129590 (see paper below).
- My current PhD student Aarynn Carter, jointly advised by David Sing, works on both Transit Transmission Spectroscopy using HST, as well as High Contrast imaging with JWST.
Some Selected Publications:
- Hinkley et al. 2015. "Discovery of Seven Companions to Intermediate-Mass Stars with Extreme Mass Ratios in the Scorpius-Centaurus Association" https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2015ApJ...806L...9H/abstract
- Hinkley et al. 2015. "Early Results from VLT SPHERE: Long-slit Spectroscopy of 2MASS0122-2439B, a Young Companion Near the Deuterium Burning Limit." https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2015ApJ...805L..10H/abstract
- Matthews et al. 2017. "The First Scattered-light Image of the Debris Disk around the Sco-Cen Target HD129590." https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2017ApJ...843L..12M/abstract
- Hinkley et al., 2011. "A New High Contrast Imaging Program at Palomar Observatory." https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2011PASP..123...74H/abstract