Lisa Harvey-Smith

Postdoctoral Fellow in Radio Polarimetry

I'm an astrophysicist, working as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of Sydney. My main research interests are cosmic magnetism, Faraday rotation, masers, massive star-formation, supernova remnants and Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI). I co-ordinate the University of Sydney's Astrophysical Maser Group. I am chair of the Australia Telescope Time Allocation Committee. I also teach undergraduate course PHY1500: Introductory Astronomy and supervise undergraduate and postgraduate research projects.

I work at the Sydney Institute for Astronomy, which is part of the School of Physics at the University of Sydney. We are located on the beautiful Camperdown campus in the centre of Sydney, which dates back to 1850.

Latest News:

Astrophysical Journal paper published My paper on the magnetic field of supernova remnant G296.5+10.0 has been accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journal and is now available in preprint here.

12-hour ultramarathon In January 2010 I competed in the Narrabeen all-nighter 12-hour race. I ran around a lake non-stop from 8pm - 8am, clocking up 103.78km. This earned me first place and a women's race record. It wouldn't have been possible without my fantastic crew handing me food and drinks every 10 minutes all night. Great teamwork guys!

ApJ paper submitted In November 2009 I submitted a paper on the origin of the magnetic field in the supernova remnant shell of G296.5+10.0 to the Astrophysical Journal. Pre-prints will be available soon.

Oxfam Trailwalker On Friday August 28th with team-mates Anna, Helen and Sally I ran the 100km Oxfam Trailwalker event from Brooklyn to Mosman. Our team finished in 18 hours 37 mins, placing 13th overall and 2nd in the women's race. We were delighted to have raised over $3000 for Oxfam. Many thanks to our fantastic crew and to all our sponsors!

Talented Students Welcome to undergraduate students Emma Lindley and Benjamin Pope who are working with me on studies of astronomical masers using the Parkes and MERLIN radio telescopes as part of the University of Sydney's Talented Students Program.

International Visiting Fellow During July 2009 we hosted Professor Moshe Elitzur as an International Visiting Fellow at the University of Sydney. It was a very productive time and we look forward to continuing our collaborative project on theoretical modeling of astronomical masers in disks.

Canberra ultra-marathon On 19th April 2009 I finished the Canberra 50km ultra-marathon with a net time of 5 hours 11 mins.

Summer Student project David Webster, a third year undergraduate student is working with Tim Robishaw and I on imaging methanol 12.2-GHz masers using the VLBA. The aim is to determine the proper motions of the masers both in the molecular envelope of the ultra-compact HII region W3(OH) and in the broadline region at the probable site of the massive OB star(s) that are ionising the region.

A methanol maser in a massive circumstellar disc My latest paper on EVN observations of methanol 6.7-GHz masers in a massive circumstellar disc is available through astro-ph.

GALFACTS project observations The G-ALFA Continuum Transit Survey (GALFACTS) is a polarimetric survey of the entire Arecibo sky. In November I took part in one of the first full observing runs for this survey at the Arecibo 305m telescope in Puerto Rico. I am also working on automation of the bandpass calibration of the data with colleagues at the University of Calgary.

If you would like more information about my research, please check out the navigation bar (left) or contact me personally. This website will be updated regularly.