Katja Fahrion

Research Fellow

 

Main Research Fields

I am interested in massive star clusters such as globular clusters and nuclear star clusters and their potential as tracers of galaxy evolution. Both globular clusters and nuclear star clusters are dense concentrations of stars that sometimes contain millions of stars tightly packed together and are therefore visible in distant galaxies. Due to their old ages - often comparable to the age of the Universe, these star clusters are regarded as fossil records of galaxy formation and evolution that still contain information of their birthplace. My research focuses on exploring the formation conditions of these star clusters and what they can tell us about galaxy evolution.

To study globular clusters and nuclear star clusters, I use archival Hubble Space Telescope data in combination with ground-based integral-field spectroscopic data from ESO's VLT/MUSE instrument. Once the James Webb Space Telescope operates, I hope to also study more nearby star forming regions. 


Keywords

- star clusters

- globular clusters

- nuclear star clusters

- galaxy evolution

- stellar populations

Ongoing collaborations

- ESA (Guido de Marchi, Tereza Jerabkova)

- ESO (Mariya Lyubenova, Michael Hilker, Avinash Chaturvedi)

- Fornax3D (Website)

Publications

See my publications on ADS or ORCID.

Personal website: http://KatjaFahrion.github.io