Biography

I am an associate research professor at the Department of Astronomy/Steward Observatory at University of Arizona, as well as the project scientist of Aspera, a UV small-satellite mission funded by NASA Astronphysics Pioneers program. Before I started my current position, I was a postdoc at the Steward Observatory, worked with Prof. Erika Hamden. I did my Ph.D. at Seoul National University (SNU), Republic of Korea. I was also a research assistant/student fellow in the School of Physics at Korea Institute for Advanced Study (KIAS). My Ph.D. advisors were Prof. Yong-Sun Park at SNU and Prof. Changbom Park at KIAS. I had worked with the instrumentation group (Head: Prof. A. N. Ramaprakash) at Inter University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA) in Pune, India during my Ph.D.

My research focus is on astronomical instrumentation and observational astronomy, in particular building UV/Optical telescope and instruments, and studying the circumgalactic medium and kinematics of galaxies.

Currently (as of Sep 2026), I am involved in and working on

• Aspera, a NASA-funded UV SmallSat space telescope mission for mapping the distribution of coronal gas at around nearby galaxy halos as the project scientist,
• SHIMCO, a NASA-funded UV sounding rocket telescope mission, as a Co-I,
• PUFFINS, a NASA-funded UV SmallSat space telescope mission for studying insterstellar dust via UV spectro-polarimetry, as a Co-I,
• Nox, a UV Smallsat space telescope mission concept for mapping the all-sky EUV and FUV background, as the PI,
• GlowSat, a UV CubeSat space telescope mission concept for mapping UV airglow line distribution on LEO, as the PI,
• Eos/Hyperion, a SMEX/MIDEX-class high-spectral resolution UV space telescope mission concept, as a Co-I,
• K-SPEC, a ground-based multi-object fiber spectrograph for local galaxy redshift survey, as a member.

Previously, I was heavily involved in the development of optical multi-IFU spectrograph (DOTIFS) at IUCAA. I also had worked on the optical alignment of FIREBall-2, a NASA-funded UV balloon telescope mission.