Lou Nigra

Graduate Student

Contact Information

Lou Nigra
Arecibo Observatory
HC 3 Box 53995
Arecibo, PR 00612

Office: 305 Building 2
Email: nigra [at] astro wisc edu

About me

I am a fourth year graduate student in Astronomy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where I work with Snezana Stanimirovic and Jay Gallagher. My research interests include the Magellanic Stream and the morphology and evolution of HII regions. On the instrumentation side, I am also interested in Radio Frequency Interference (RFI) mitigation in radio telescopes through active hardware approaches.

I am currently working at the National Astronomy and Ionosphere Center near Arecibo, Puerto Rico under a one-year pre-doctoral position performing research in two of my areas of interest: The nature of the interface between the Magellanic Stream and the Galactic Halo,and RFI mitigation.

In pursuit of a new career in Astronomy, I left an electrical engineering career in 2003, obtained a M.S. in Physics at the University of Illinois at Chicago and joined the UW Astronomy Ph.D. program in 2005.

My CV

Publications

“NGC 602 Environment, Kinematics and Origins”, Nigra, L.; Gallagher, J. S., III; Smith, L. J.; Stanimirović, S.; Nota, A.; Sabbi, E., The Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, Volume 120, Issue 871, pp. 972-982.  2008PASP..120..972N (arXiv:0808.1033v1 [astro-ph])

“MEMs-based speckle spectrometer”, Sheinis, A. I.; Nigra, L. ; Kuhlen, M. Q., Advances in Adaptive Optics II, Proceedings of the SPIE, Vol 6272. pp. 62724U, 2006. 2006SPIE.6272E.153S (arXiv:astro-ph/0606179).

Teaching

In the fall of 2005, I was a Teaching Assistant for Astronomy 103 working with Professor Amy Barger.

In the fall of 2007, I was a Teaching Assistant for Physics 104 working with Professor Clint Sprott. Here is a link to my section webpage: Physics 104 Fall 2007

In the spring of 2008, I was a Teaching Assistant for Astronomy 103 working with Dr. Trevor Irwin.