C. E. BrasseurI am currently a PhD student studying with Professor Moira Jardine at the University of St Andrews. My research focuses on the magnetic fields of cool stars, specifically studying stellar coronas in the radio regime. In addition to stellar astronomy, I am a dedicated astronomical software developer with a particular interest in astronomical data sonification.
I am using Zeeman-Dopper Imaging (ZDI) surface magnetic field maps of the fast-rotating young star AB Dor to model the magnetic field structure of the corona. Within the model I locate stellar prominences (cool, dense clouds of gas trapped within the million-degree plasma of a star's corona) and determine their mass. I am using these models in combination with observational data to test the overall stellar field structure and define the extent of the stellar corona.
In collaboration with Dr. Rachel Osten, I have produced two studies of stellar flares in the optical and near-ultraviolet. In Brasseur et al. 2019 we present a collection of short-duration ultra-violet flares in data from the GALEX space telescope. In Brasseur et al. 2023 we combine the GALEX data with coincident optical data from the Kepler space telescope. In this study we show that current flare models significantly underestimate the amont of UV radiation as compared to optical flux, and highlights the need for more physically grounded approximations for flare energy fractionation.
I am one of three package maintainers for Astroquery, a set of tools for querying astronomical web forms and databases. It provides streamlined Python access to a plethora of astronomical archives and datasets, and is part of the Astropy Project.
I am the lead developer and maintainer of Astronify, a package for sonifying astronomical data, particularly timeseries data such as light curves.
I was the original developer (from inception until August 2021) of Astrocut, a package of cutout tools for astronomical data. It offers efficent cutouts of Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite full-frame image sets as well as more generic "fits-cut" tools. Astrocut is the software that backs the TESScut and zCut cutout services.
A selection of talks and tutorials that I have given for which there are materials available online.
MSc dissertaion github repository and pdf.
With Jenn Kotler and Scott Fleming. Presentation video.
I am also a composer. This is a selection of recordings of my pieces as well as my masters thesis.
