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ESA/AURA Astronomer
Travis Fischer headshot

Joining STScI in 2020 as an ESA/AURA Astronomer II, Dr. Travis Fischer provides support for the Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (COS) aboard the Hubble Space Telescope. He also led development of data products for major Hubble programs, including the Hubble UV Legacy Library of Young Stars as Essential Standards (ULLYSES), the Hubble Advanced Spectroscopic Products (HASP), and the Hubble Spectral Legacy Archive (HSLA).

Prior to joining STScI, Travis was a Research Faculty member through both George Mason University at the United States Naval Observatory and The Catholic University of America at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. He was also a NASA Postdoctoral Program Fellow at Goddard, focusing on James Webb Space Telescope science.

His research centers on Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) and their impact on galaxy evolution, with a particular focus on how radio emission in radio-quiet AGN is driven by shocks from radiatively driven winds. He has extensive experience with multi-wavelength observations, including studies of the kinematics of ionized gas in AGN across the infrared, optical, and radio wavebands. He is a lead investigator on several James Webb Space Telescope and Hubble Space Telescope programs, studying AGN feedback and its effects on the host interstellar medium using spatially-resolved spectroscopy. Recent work highlights parsec-scale feedback in nearby galaxies and creating Bayesian tools for emission-line spectroscopy. His research has appeared in The Astrophysical Journal and other peer-reviewed journals and has been presented at major international conferences.

Education:

PhD in Astronomy, Georgia State University
MS in Astronomy, Georgia State University
BA in Physics, University of Wisconsin - Whitewater

 

Science Interests:

  • Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN)
  • Galaxy Evolution
  • Outflows
  • Optical/Near-IR IFU Spectroscopy
  • Molecular Gas
  • Radio Structures
  • Emission-Line Modeling

 

Research Topics: Supermassive Black Holes, High-Redshift Galaxies, AGN and Quasars

 

Professional Websites:

Professional Website

 

ORCID ID: 0000-0002-3365-8875

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