Andrew Chael

Position
Postdoctoral Fellow
Role
2019-2022
Title
NASA Hubble Fellowship Program (NHFP) Einstein Fellow; John A. Wheeler Postdoctoral Fellow 2021-2022
Office Phone
Office
411A Jadwin Hall
Bio/Description

I study the hot accretion disks and relativistic jets just outside the event horizons of supermassive black holes. I work on advanced numerical simulations of these accretion flows that incorporate radiation, particle heating, and acceleration from plasma microphysics and study how these effects modify the images, variability, and spectra from these objects. I am particularly interested in understanding the mechanisms producing the extremely bright flares from the galactic center supermassive black hole, Sgr A*, and how they may be used to probe the spacetime in the near-horizon region. As a member of the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) collaboration, I also work on developing new techniques for producing and interpreting resolved images of the nearest supermassive black holes in Sgr A* and in the giant galaxy M87.