Meet the Team
Teodora is a graduate student at MIT and is working both in the Computational Structure and Galaxy Formation Group as well as the Cosmic Dawn group at MIT. She is an expert in cosmological simulations and is studying the growth of supermassive black holes and the size of quasar proximity zones in the Illustris TNG and Thesan simulations. She is also studying dust-obscured quasars in deep mid-infrared observations with the James Webb Space Telescope.
Personal WebsiteYuzo joined MIT in the fall of 2024 after finishing his PhD at Johns Hopkins University. He is an expert in galaxy evolution and is particularly interested in studying galaxies hosting two supermassive black holes, so-called dual quasars, as well as understanding quasar feedback. He uses integral field spectroscopy to study the host galaxies of quasars and the dynamics of the gas in their environment from Cosmic Noon to Cosmic Dawn.
Personal WebsiteGene joined MIT in the fall of 2024. He is an expert in large spectroscopic imaging surveys and aims to understand how supermassive black holes shape the evolution of their host galaxies. He is also the PI of a 74-hour program on JWST called "MIRI Early Obscured-AGN Wide Survey" (MEOW), which will shed new light onto the fraction of obscured black hole growth in the early universe. Furthermore, Gene is very interested in mentoring undergraduates to do cutting-edge research.
Personal WebsiteBenedetta will join MIT as a postdoctoral researcher in November 2026. She is an expert in studying the intergalactic medium during the Epoch of Reionization using high-redshift quasars. Her research focuses on understanding the timing and topology of reionization through large-scale Lyman-alpha forest correlations, quasar tomography, and galaxy–IGM correlations, combining spectroscopic observations with cosmological simulations.
Personal WebsiteAlberto is an expert in studying proto-clusters around quasars using multi-wavelength observations and cosmological simulations. At MIT, he will study the proto-clusters around high-redshift quasars using JWST and Chandra observations. Before joining MIT, Alberto did his PhD at the University of Bologna.
John joined MIT in the fall of 2025 as a Brinson Prize Fellow, having completed his PhD at the Cosmic Dawn Center, University of Copenhagen. An expert on galaxy evolution, he studies how galaxies formed and assembled, combining near-infrared surveys with state-of-the-art software to identify massive galaxies across cosmic history and probe their properties through integral field spectroscopy. He leads the Cosmic Dawn Survey, part of ESA's Euclid Mission.
Personal WebsiteFormer Group Members
Studied the emission of high-redshift quasars to set new constraints on the Epoch of Reionization, and the growth of early supermassive black holes using spectroscopic and IFU data from JWST and MUSE. Now a Margaret Burbidge Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Chicago.
Expert in multi-wavelength observations of high-redshift quasars and gravitationally lensed objects. Now a Bok Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Arizona.
Eric and Wendy Schmidt postdoctoral fellow at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, working on probabilistic machine learning for quasar spectra.
Undergraduate at MIT studying a high-redshift gravitationally lensed quasar with JWST. Now a graduate student at the University of Arizona.
MSRP student studying how black hole masses and bolometric luminosities are encoded in quasar spectra with machine learning.
MSRP student studying clustering properties of quasars observed with Gaia to measure quasar duty cycles. Now a graduate student at MIT.
MSRP student measuring quasar clustering with Gaia data to study dark matter halo properties across cosmic time. Now a PhD student at Johns Hopkins University.
Used multi-epoch WISE satellite data to detect changes in quasar accretion rates. Now a graduate student at Harvard University.
Analyzed spectra of high-redshift quasars observed with FIRE on the Magellan Telescope. Went on to get her PhD at the University of Cambridge.
Studied growth timescales of supermassive black holes, for which he was awarded a Barry Goldwater Scholarship. Now a PhD student at Stanford University.
Join Our Group
If you're interested in joining our group, you can find a list of resources below. Please just reach out with any questions!
MIT undergrads: please fill out this form to join as a UROP student. Outside MIT? Consider the MIT Summer Research Program.
Apply to our graduate program if you're finishing your undergraduate degree.
A likely-incomplete list of fellowship opportunities — reach out if interested:
Pappalardo Fellowship · MIT SoS Fellowship · Kavli Fellowship · NASA Hubble Fellowship · NSF Fellowship · Brinson Prize Fellowship