Ethan Silver
Physics PhD candidate at Harvard
M.A. in Physics, Harvard (2025)
B.A. in Physics, Astrophysics, and Data Science, UC Berkeley (2023)
ABOUT ME
I’m a fourth year PhD student in the Dept. of Physics at Harvard, advised by Edo Berger in the Dept. of Astronomy. My current research involves using time-domain surveys such as ZTF and Vera Rubin Observatory’s LSST to search for and study supernova precursors, the enhanced emission and brightening that can be observed months to years before a massive star explodes as a supernova.
Studying the frequency and properties of supernova precursors can help us better understand the underlying mechanisms of the stellar instability and mass loss that occurs before explosion, and ultimately advance our understanding of the final stages of massive star evolution as well as binary star evolution.
CURRENT RESEARCH
I search for and study supernova precursors, the enhanced luminous emission that can be observed months to years before a massive star collapses and explodes as a supernova, to better understand the final stages of the death of a massive star or massive star in a binary system.
This figure shows the lightcurves observed from a sample of supernova precursors.
PRIOR RESEARCH
Prior to my current research, I worked on a project training convolutional neural networks to detect gravitational wave signals from the merger of binary black holes in LIGO data.
As an undergraduate, I worked on training convolutional neural networks to detect strong gravitational lensing by galactic scale dark matter halos, with the subsequent goal of detecting strong lensing by subgalactic halos.