The current members of the group includes graduate students Viviana Cáceres, Wendy Dang, Ish Gupta, Sanika Khadkikar, and Leo Ng, postdoctoral fellows Koustav Chandra, Rossella Gamba (N3AS postdoc), Vaishak Prasad. Here is a short profile of their research.

Nidhi Biswas is a research intern working on Quasi Normal Modes of Coalescing Binaries. Her research revolves around the question “Where to black holes hide the information about how they formed?” She works on getting binary black hole simulations from Simulating eXtreme Spacetimes (SXS) catalog, extracting various multipole modes of the signal, studying the effect of mass and spin on various quasi normal modes, comparing them with binary neutron star simulations to confirm the matter effects on post merger amplitudes of quasi normal modes.

Viviana Cáceres is a second-year graduate student investigating the dynamics of precessing binary black hole systems. In particular, she looks for signatures of precession in the remnant black hole formed after a merger. Her research has uncovered revealing comparisons between different numerical relativity catalogs. Additionally, she works on developing models for neutron-star equations of state that incorporate dark matter in their cores, aiming to determine potential dark matter signatures in gravitational waves from binary neutron star mergers.

Outside of research, Viviana enjoys playing guitar, taking fitness classes at the IM building, and cooking.

Koustav Chandra is a Post-doctoral researcher who likes delving into the nature of gravity and black holes using gravitational waves. His work involves developing methods to detect and analyse LIGO and Virgo data, focusing on modelled searches for quasi-spherical black hole binaries, measuring binary remnant properties, and black hole spectroscopy. He is also interested in developing machine-learning methods for gravitational-wave data analysis, all while preparing for future detectors like Cosmic Explorer and the Einstein Telescope.

Outside work, he enjoys strolling, hiking, and binge-watching TV series, treating them like Olympic sports.

Wendy Dang is a first-year graduate student interested in inferring cosmology from gravitational-wave data. She is investigating how the Hubble constant could be precisely constrained using one or few kilonovae. Previously she worked on how overlapping signals could affect tests of GR.

Apart from physics, she likes music, reading philosophy and persuading others to read philosophy.

 

Mercan Demiroglu is an undergraduate research intern working on using Machine Learning to improve Quasi-Universal Relations in neutron stars. She is currently investigating the relation between neutron star compactness and the tidal Love number, and the relation between the symmetric and asymmetric combinations of tidal deformabilities.

Outside work, she enjoys drawing, bouldering, and dancing.

Ish Gupta is a fifth-year graduate student working on inferring cosmology, astrophysics, and neutron star physics with gravitational-wave observations. His research has involved analyzing both simulated and observed gravitational-wave data to constrain the Hubble constant with golden dark sirens, infer the equation of state of neutron stars, perform multi-messenger analysis with gravitational-wave and electromagnetic transient data, test general relativity, and assess the science capabilities of next-generation gravitational-wave detectors.

Apart from work, Ish is an ardent sports fan, with particular interests in cricket, football (soccer), chess, and martial arts.

Sanika Khadkikar is a third-year PhD student focused on neutron stars and their role in advancing our understanding of fundamental physics. Her research spans a broad range of topics, including equation of state (EoS) modeling, parameter estimation, population synthesis, and the potential effects of dark matter on neutron star systems.

With an interdisciplinary approach, she aims to leverage gravitational waves to address key cosmological and astrophysical questions, uniting insights from astronomy and fundamental physics in her doctoral thesis.

 

Dhruv Kumar is a research intern working on Acceleration Gravitational-Wave Tests of General Relativity with Relative Binning under the mentorship of Ish Gupta. He is interested in gravitational wave astronomy and is a Tier 1 member of the Indian Pulsar Timing Array (InPTA). Dhruv is eager to learn more about instrumentation and machine learning models to make GW Detection more effective and efficient. Outside of academics, he enjoys taking long walks and reflecting on both the good and challenging experiences in life. Dhruv looks forward to new adventures.

Akshita Mittal is a research intern studying post-merger binary neutron star signals. Her work aims to answer the question, “Do neutron stars have hair?” This involves looking for matter signatures in quasi-normal mode amplitudes of prompt-collapse binary neutron star signals and comparing them to those of binary black hole mergers to identify the presence of matter signatures, contributing to a deeper understanding of neutron star dynamics.

Her non-academic interests include solving jigsaw puzzles, doodling and taking long walks.

Leo Ng is a first-year graduate student interested in gravitational wave lensing and data analysis. He worked on statistically improving the efficiency of the search for faint GW signals and lens-source systems correlated with two or more detected lensed GWs, by evaluating their consistencies with the detected signals. 

Monica Rincon-Ramirez enjoys drawing new connections between fundamental theory and observations. Her graduate work includes specialized topics in general relativity, loop quantum gravity, and quantum fields in cosmological backgrounds. In particular, her thesis work focused on finding effective quantum corrections to gravitational phenomena from spinfoams, and applications to cosmology.

As a post-graduate research intern for PAX, and in collaboration with Ish Gupta, Monica aims to bring closer the branches of gravitational wave observations and black hole thermodynamics. In particular, using techniques from thermodynamics and statistical mechanics to better understand binary black hole mergers, she pursues to supplement the numerical and mechanical approaches to parameter estimation.

In her spare time, Monica enjoys learning languages, listening to music, and expressing herself through arts and crafts. Monica was the designer of the current wordmark for the Institute for Gravitation and the Cosmos.