Colloquium – Jeyhan Kartaltepe – Pushing the Edge of the Cosmic Frontier with JWST

Speaker: Jeyhan Kartaltepe (Rochester Institute of Technology)

Title: Pushing the Edge of the Cosmic Frontier with JWST

Abstract:

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) launched in December 2021, first started collecting data in June 2022,  and is already revolutionizing our understanding of the distant Universe. With its large, segmented mirror, and optimization for infrared wavelengths, JWST was designed to detect and characterize some of the first galaxies to form in our universe and investigate how galaxies then evolve over the age of the Universe to the present day. In this talk, I will present how JWST has pushed our cosmic frontier beyond what was previously possible and highlight what we have learned from the first year of extragalactic deep surveys and their implications for our understanding of the early universe. I will also present some of the first results from the largest Cycle 1 general observer program, COSMOS-Web.

Bio:

Dr. Kartaltepe is an astrophysicist in the School of Physics and Astronomy at the Rochester Institute of Technology. She received her BA from Colgate University and her MS & Ph.D. from the University of Hawaii. She is an expert in the areas of galaxy formation and evolution, galaxy morphologies, galaxy mergers and interactions, and the properties of infrared galaxies. She is a co-PI of the large collaboration COSMOS (The Cosmic Evolution Survey), which is a large area multiwavelength extragalactic survey, utilizing nearly every major ground- and space-based telescope. She is a PI of the COSMOS-Web Cycle 1 JWST program (the largest GO program) and a leading co-I for CEERS (The Cosmic Evolution Early Release Science Survey).

Host: Preethi Nair