Two PhD positions to join the new research team StarHearts of Prof. Eva Laplace at the Institute of Astronomy, KU Leuven, Belgium.
When stars end their lives, their hearts continue to exist in a different, exotic form, known as a compact remnant: black holes, neutron stars, or white dwarfs. Understanding the exact origin of these objects is one of the most pressing scientific questions in astrophysics at this time. With the discovery of gravitational waves (GWs), we have a new way to study these extreme objects. To make breakthroughs in understanding the properties of stellar remnants and the GWs they generate, it is crucial to study the binary stellar hearts and the core-collapse process that form them. The application should be received by December 16th, 2025.
PhD project 1 – Investigating the Explosion and Implosion Signatures of Binary Stars
The aim of this PhD project is to characterize the observable explosion and implosion signatures of stars that have interacted in a binary star system. The ultimate goal of this project is to develop theoretical models to interpret the observations of explosive transients (in particular stripped-envelope supernovae) and connect these back to the properties of the stellar hearts that generate them.
PhD Project 2 – Characterizing the Heartbeats of Binary Evolution Products
The hearts of stars that interact in binary systems are expected to be systematically different from those of single stars. In particular, binary stars grow cores of different masses and different chemical composition, and have different interior mixing and rotation behaviors. Therefore the observable oscillations – or “heartbeats” – of such stars, from internal pressure and gravity waves, are expected to be systematically different. The ultimate aim of this project will be to characterize the observable asteroseismic signals of binary evolution products and to obtain observational constraints on the physical properties of the hearts of stars that form gravitational-wave sources.
More information on https://fys.kuleuven.be/ster/vacancies/vacancies#PhD_StarHearts