Jillian Rastinejad Astronomy PhD Candidate

Welcome!

I am a Presidential Fellow and Astronomy Ph.D. Candidate in the Center for Interdisciplinary Exploration and Research in Astrophysics (CIERA) and Department of Physics and Astronomy at Northwestern University. I am also an active member of the Searches After Gravitational Waves Using ARizona Observatories (SAGUARO) Collaboration.

Research

I leverage rapid-response observations from premier telescopes (like Gemini-North Observatory, pictured here!) to study the astrophysical origins of the heavy elements, including silver and gold. My research aims to answer questions such as:

  • What are the explosions that create heavy elements?
  • What can these explosions teach us about black holes and neutron stars?
  • How do the explosions' properties, like mass and composition, connect to their high-energy or gravitational wave features?

Home
In front of Gemini-North Observatory
Mauna Kea landscape
Telescopes on the summit of Mauna Kea, viewed from Gemini Observatory.

First-author Publications

Uniform Modeling of Observed Kilonovae: Implications for Diversity and the Progenitors of Merger-Driven Long Gamma-Ray Bursts. Rastinejad, J. C., Fong, W., Kilpatrick, C. D. et al. 2024. Submitted to The Astrophysical Journal. arXiv ID: 2409.02158.

A Hubble Space Telescope Search for r-Process Nucleosynthesis in Gamma-ray Burst Supernovae. Rastinejad, J. C., Fong, W., Levan, A. J. et al. 2024. The Astrophysical Journal, 968, 14.

A Kilonova Following a Long-Duration Gamma-ray Burst at 350 Mpc. Rastinejad, J. C., Gompertz, B. P., Levan, A. J. et al. 2022. Nature, 612, 7939.

A Systematic Exploration of Kilonova Candidates from Neutron Star Mergers During the Third Gravitational Wave Observing Run. Rastinejad, J. C., Paterson, K., Fong, W. et al. 2022. The Astrophysical Journal, 927, 50.

Probing Kilonova Ejecta Properties Using a Catalog of Short Gamma-Ray Burst Observations. Rastinejad, J. C., Fong, W., Kilpatrick, C. D. et al. 2021. The Astrophysical Journal, 916, 89.