Dr. Miles Currie

Research

About me: I am a sixth-year doctoral candidate at the University of Washington pursuing a dual-title PhD in Astronomy and Astrobiology. I am a member of UW's Virtual Planetary Laboratory and conduct research under the advisement of Prof. Vikki Meadows. Broadly, I work to understand how we can use the upcoming extremely large telescopes to search for signs of habitability and life on terrestrial-sized exoplanets orbiting nearby M-dwarf stars. I use high-resolution spectroscopy and cross-correlation analysis to find signals of molecular species in planetary atmospheres. When I'm not thinking about ground-based observations, I work to predict how we may be able to directly image Earth-like exoplanets with the future space-based Habitable Worlds Observatory.

Publications: Link to ORCID

Science highlights:

We may be able to use the future ground-based extremely large telescopes to search for the CO2/CH4 biosignature disequilibrium pair on nearby transiting terrestrial exoplanets.
There's More to Life than O2: Simulating the Detectability of a Range of Molecules for Ground-based, High-resolution Spectroscopy of Transiting Terrestrial Exoplanets
Currie et al. 2023a

Exozodiacal debris disks may impede our ability to detect Earth-like exoplanets in direct images. However, applying an optimized high-pass filter may allow us to fit and remove even the worst-case-scenario mean motion resonance structures.
Mitigating Worst-Case Exozodiacal Dust Structure in Direct Images of Earth-like Exoplanets
Currie et al. 2023b

We do not find evidence for iron in the atmosphere of lava planet 55 Cancri e, suggesting the presence of a thin mineral atmosphere.
A Non-Detection of Iron in the First High-Resolution Emission Study of the Lava Planet 55 Cnc e
Rasmussen and Currie et al. 2023

Community

Science is not an individual pursuit. Science can only happen when people work together to achieve a common goal, and over the years I have found ways to give back to my scientific community in this regard.

Active service positions:
Co-chair, Science Communication Working Group for NASA’s Nexus for Exoplanet System Science
Member, ExoPAG’s Study Analysis Group 23: The Impact of Exo-Zodiacal Dust on Exoplanet Direct Imaging Surveys

You can find links to my NExSS Newsletter designs here!

Outside

When I'm not doing science, you can find me on (or off) the trails!

Contact

Email: [email protected]

• Instagram
• GitHub

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