Dr Alexander Scholz

Director of the University Observatory and Reader

Phone: +44 (0)1334 46 1668
Email: as110@st-andrews.ac.uk

Teaching

My teaching is focused on observational and introductory astrophysics. I am module coordinator and lecturer in first year astrophysics. I also coordinate the observational components of the MSc program in astrophysics. I provide observing training at our local telescopes for postgraduate and undergraduate students. In addition, I teach introductory astronomy for non-science students.

Research areas

I am an observational astronomer working on problems in star and planet formation. Since 2006 I am leading the project SONYC, which conducts unbiased extremely deep imaging and spectroscopy surveys of nearby star forming regions, with the goal to find all young brown dwarfs and free-floating planetary mass objects. This project will continue in the next years with new facilities like James Webb Space Telescope and with Gaia. I analyse accretion and disks of young sources, with the goal to constrain formation scenarios for stars, brown dwarfs and planets. Using time-domain observations, I study rotation, surface properties, and the dynamical environments of young stellar and substellar objects. I am working with 8-m telescopes like the ESO/VLT and Subaru, with space telescopes like Spitzer and Kepler, with submm facilities like ALMA and SMA, with the robotic 1-m telescoes of the Las Cumbres Observatory, and with our local James Gregory Telescope, the largest telescope in Scotland.

Selected publications

Open access

A survey for variable young stars with small telescopes: IX - evolution of spot properties on YSOs in IC 5070
Herbert, C., Froebrich, D., Vanaverbeke, S., Scholz, A., Eislöffel, J., Urtly, T., Walton, I. L., Wiersema, K., Quinn, N. J., Piehler, G., Aimar, M. M., García, R. C., Vanmunster, T., Alfaro, F. C. S., de la Cuesta, F. G., Licchelli, D., Perez, A. E., Mañanes, E. F., Ribes, N. G., González, J. L. S., & 28 others Futcher, S. R. L., Nelson, T., Dvorak, S., Moździerski, D., Kotysz, K., Mikołajczyk, P., Fleming, G., Phillips, M., Vale, T., Dubois, F., Eggenstein, H-B., Heald, M. A., Lewin, P., OKeeffe, D., Popowicz, A., Bernacki, K., Malcher, A., Lasota, S., Fiolka, J., Dustor, A., Percy, S. C., Devine, P., Patel, A. L., Dickers, M. D., Dover, L., Grozdanova, I. I., Urquhart, J. S. & Lynch, C. J. R., 4 Apr 2024, (E-pub ahead of print) In: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 529, 4
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open access

A survey for variable young stars with small telescopes VII. Spot properties on YSOs in IC 5070
Herbert, C., Froebrich, D. & Scholz, A., 1 Apr 2023, In: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 520, 4, p. 5433–5445 13 p., stac3051.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open access

Disks around young planetary-mass objects: ultradeep spitzer imaging of NGC 1333
Scholz, A., Muzic, K., Jayawardhana, R., Almendros-Abad, V. & Wilson, I., 1 May 2023, In: Astronomical Journal. 165, 5, 8 p., 196.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open access

Stable accretion in young stars: the cases of EX Lupi and TW Hya
Sicilia-Aguilar, A., Campbell-White, J., Roccatagliata, V., Desira, J., Gregory, S. G., Scholz, A., Fang, M., de Miera, F. C-S., Kóspál, Á., Matsumura, S. & Ábrahám, P., Dec 2023, In: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 526, 4, p. 4885-4907
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open access

A survey for variable young stars with small telescopes: VII -- spot properties on YSOs in IC5070
Herbert, C., Froebrich, D. & Scholz, A., 22 Oct 2022, (Accepted/In press) In: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. Preprint, 14 p.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open access

Results from The COPAINS Pilot Survey: four new brown dwarfs and a high companion detection rate for accelerating stars
Bonavita, M., Fontanive, C., Gratton, R., Mužić, K., Desidera, S., Mesa, D., Biller, B., Scholz, A., Sozzetti, A. & Squicciarini, V., Jul 2022, In: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 513, 4, p. 5588–5605 20 p., stac1250.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open access

Rogue planets and brown dwarfs: predicting the populations of free-floating planetary mass objects observable with JWST
Scholz, A., Muzic, K., Jayawardhana, R., Quinlan, L. & Wurster, J., 11 Oct 2022, In: Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific. 134, 1040, 10 p., 104401.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open access

The near-infrared imager and slitless spectrograph for the James Webb Space Telescope: II. Wide field slitless spectroscopy
Willott, C. J., Doyon, R., Albert, L., Brammer, G. B., Dixon, W. V., Muzic, K., Ravindranath, S., Scholz, A., Abraham, R., Artigau, É., Bradač, M., Goudfrooij, P., Hutchings, J. B., Iyer, K. G., Jayawardhana, R., LaMassa, S., Martis, N., Meyer, M. R., Morishita, T., Mowla, L., & 9 others Muzzin, A., Noirot, G., Pacifici, C., Rowlands, N., Sarrouh, G., Sawicki, M., Taylor, J. M., Volk, K. & Zabl, J., 25 Feb 2022, (E-pub ahead of print) In: Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific. 134, 1032, 16 p., 025002.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open access

The protoplanetary disk population in the ρ-Ophiuchi region L1688 and the time evolution of Class II YSOs
Testi, L., Natta, A., Manara, C. F., de Gregorio Monsalvo, I., Lodato, G., Lopez, C., Muzic, K., Pascucci, I., Sanchis, E., Miranda, A. S., Scholz, A., De Simone, M. & Williams, J. P., 19 Jul 2022, In: Astronomy & Astrophysics. 663, 22 p., A98.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open access

Gaia Early Data Release 3: Gaia photometric science alerts
Hodgkin, S. T., Harrison, D. L., Breedt, E., Wevers, T., Rixon, G., Delgado, A., Yoldas, A., Kostrzewa-Rutkowska, Z., Wyrzykowski, Ł., van Leeuwen, M., Blagorodnova, N., Campbell, H., Eappachen, D., Fraser, M., Ihanec, N., Koposov, S. E., Kruszyńska, K., Marton, G., Rybicki, K. A., Brown, A. G. A., & 91 others Burgess, P. W., Busso, G., Cowell, S., De Angeli, F., Diener, C., Evans, D. W., Gilmore, G., Holland, G., Jonker, P. G., van Leeuwen, F., Mignard, F., Osborne, P. J., Portell, J., Prusti, T., Richards, P. J., Riello, M., Seabroke, G. M., Walton, N. A., Ábrahám, P., Altavilla, G., Baker, S. G., Bastian, U., O'Brien, P., de Bruijne, J., Butterley, T., Carrasco, J. M., Castañeda, J., Clark, J. S., Clementini, G., Copperwheat, C. M., Cropper, M., Damljanovic, G., Davidson, M., Davis, C. J., Dennefeld, M., Dhillon, V. S., Dolding, C., Dominik, M., Esquej, P., Eyer, L., Fabricius, C., Fridman, M., Froebrich, D., Garralda, N., Gomboc, A., González-Vidal, J. J., Guerra, R., Hambly, N. C., Hardy, L. K., Holl, B., Hourihane, A., Japelj, J., Kann, D. A., Kiss, C., Knigge, C., Kolb, U., Komossa, S., Kóspál, Á., Kovács, G., Kun, M., Leto, G., Lewis, F., Littlefair, S. P., Mahabal, A. A., Mundell, C. G., Nagy, Z., Padeletti, D., Palaversa, L., Pigulski, A., Pretorius, M. L., van Reeven, W., Ribeiro, V. A. R. M., Roelens, M., Rowell, N., Schartel, N., Scholz, A., Schwope, A., Sipőcz, B. M., Smartt, S. J., Smith, M. D., Serraller, I., Steeghs, D., Sullivan, M., Szabados, L., Szegedi-Elek, E., Tisserand, P., Tomasella, L., van Velzen, S., Whitelock, P. A., Wilson, R. W. & Young, D. R., Aug 2021, In: Astronomy & Astrophysics. 652, 25 p., A76.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

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