Dr. Kalas studied Astronomy and Physics at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor and earned a Ph.D with astronomer David Jewitt at the University of Hawaii. Before coming to UC Berkeley in 2000, he worked as a postdoctoral scientist with Steven Beckwith at the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Heidelberg, and the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore. He is an elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and in 2009 received the AAAS Newcomb Cleveland Prize for the most outstanding paper published in the journal Science. Dr. Kalas founded the Spirit of Lyot conference series and developed an innovative astronomy graduate course on science ethics. He is the author of two books, The Oneironauts and Crete Swim, with a third in development based on his astronomy ethics course. At Berkeley he works on various committees including graduate admissions.
Dr. Kalas images planetary systems around other stars using the Hubble Space Telescope, the James Webb Space Telescope, ALMA, Keck, Gemini, and many other major astronomical observatories. See his detailed website for additional information. His research led to the discoveries of dusty debris disks around nearby stars as well as Fomalhaut b1 and b2. He is a science team member on several major projects, such as the Gemini Planet Imager, which is a pioneering ground-based instrument to directly images extrasolar planets and debris disks.
Specialty Areas: Observational astronomy, circumstellar matter around main sequence and pre-main sequence stars, exosolar planets, high contrast imaging with adaptive optics and the Hubble Space Telescope, mid-infrared and sub-millimeter imaging, optical and near-infrared coronagraphy, stellar and planetary dynamics.
Projects: The Gemini Planet Imager
Debris disk lead and SSC member: Paul Kalas
The Gemini Planet Imager (GPI) is an advanced science instrument that exploits the latest generation of adaptive optics technology, coronagraphy and detectors. We successfully commissioned GPI at the Gemini South telescope in Chile and in 2014 we conducted a five-year science program called GPIES (GPI Exoplanet Survey) that will survey 600 stars for the presence of young giant planets and debris disks. An upgraded GPI will be commissioned on the Gemini North telescope in 2025.
Youtube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@Paul_Kalas
