Michael P. Fitzgerald

Michael P. Fitzgerald
Michelson Postdoctoral Fellow, LLNL
Assistant Professor, UCLA

L-413, Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
Livermore, CA 94551
USA

Physics and Astronomy Building
430 Portola Plaza, Box 951547
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1547
USA

mpfitz@llnl.gov
mpfitz@ucla.edu

I am a postdoctoral researcher in the Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics (IGPP) at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL). I have recently joined the faculty in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) as an Assistant Professor. I will be there full-time in the summer of 2010.

Research Interests

I am interested in extrasolar planets and their formation. In order to study these objects and processes, I am seeking to advance astronomical instrumentation and observational technique. Particularly interesting are indirect and direct techniques for detecting extrasolar planets with adaptive optics, coronagraphy, and interferometry. I am also studying dust disks around main sequence stars. High-contrast observations of circumstellar debris can reveal signatures of planet formation.

Research Links

Selected Publications [ADS; RID]:

Maness, H. L., Kalas, P., Peek, K. M. G., Chiang, E. I., Scherer, K., Fitzgerald, M. P., Graham, J. R., Hines, D. C., Schneider, G., & Metchev, S. A. "Hubble Space Telescope Optical Imaging of the Eroding Debris Disk HD 61005." Astrophysical Journal, 707 (2009): 1098-1114 [ADS; PDF]
Fitzgerald, M. P., Kalas, P., & Graham, J. R. "Orbital Constraints on the beta Pic Inner Planet Candidate with Keck Adaptive Optics." Astrophysical Journal, 706 (2009): L41-45 [ADS; PDF]
Chen, C. H., Fitzgerald, M. P., & Smith, P. S. "A Possible Icy Kuiper Belt around HD 181327." Astrophysical Journal, 689 (2008): 539-544 [ADS; PDF]
Kalas, P., Graham, J. R., Chiang, E., Fitzgerald, M. P., Clampin, M., Kite, E. S., Stapelfeldt, K., Marois, C., & Krist, J. "Optical Images of an Exosolar Planet 25 Light-Years from Earth." Science, 322 (2008): 1345-1348 [ADS; PDF]
Maness, H. L., Fitzgerald, M. P., Paladini, R., Kalas, P., Duchêne, G., & Graham, J. R. "CARMA Millimeter-Wave Aperture Synthesis Imaging of the HD 32297 Debris Disk." Astrophysical Journal, 686 (2008): L25-L28 [ADS ; PDF]
Fitzgerald, M. P., Kalas, P. G., & Graham, J. R. "A Ring of Warm Dust in the HD 32297 Debris Disk." Astrophysical Journal, 670 (2007): 557-564 [ADS; PDF]
Fitzgerald, M. P., Kalas, P. G., Duchêne, G., Pinte, C., & Graham, J. R. "The AU Mic Debris Disk: Multiwavelength Imaging and Modeling." Astrophysical Journal, 670 (2007): 536-556 [ADS; PDF]
Fitzgerald, M. P., & Graham, J. R. "Speckle Statistics in Adaptively Corrected Images." Astrophysical Journal 637 (2006): 541-547 [ADS; PDF]

Sample Collaborators:

Research Organizations:

Code

prep_jour.py: A script for processing a manuscript for submission to a journal. Operates in the GIGO regime.
refcounter.py: A script for counting the number of citations for each reference in a LaTeX manuscript. Useful for deciding which references should have citation aliases.

Research Interests

Research Links

Code

Other Links