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91̽»¨
Black Hole

Lensing of space time around a black hole. At 91̽»¨ we study black holes observationally and theoretically on all size and time scales - it is some of our core work.

Credit: ALAIN RIAZUELO, IAP/UPMC/CNRS. CLICK HERE TO VIEW MORE IMAGES.

Dr Becky Smethurst

Royal Astronomical Society Research Fellow

Research theme

  • Astronomy and astrophysics

Sub department

  • Astrophysics

Research groups

  • Galaxy formation and evolution
  • Hintze Centre for Astrophysical Surveys
rebecca.smethurst@physics.ox.ac.uk
  • About
  • Research
  • Prizes, awards and recognition
  • Science Communication
  • Publications

I am a Royal Astronomical Society Research Fellow at the 91̽»¨ (Christ Church). My research is focussed on nearby galaxy evolution studies; particularly the growth of supermassive black holes (SMBHs) and the processes responsible for the shut down of star formation in a galaxy. In particular I am interested in how this growth and subsequent feedback occurs in the absence of galaxy mergers. I am also working with SDSS-IV MaNGA data to determine whether feedback from growing SMBHs is responsible for the termination of star formation across the galaxy population, as has long been predicted by theoretical work without observational evidence. Alongside my research I am an enthusiastic science communicator; I run an award-winning astronomy YouTube channel, ‘Dr Becky’, with over 500,000 subscribers and 40 million total views. I was recently awarded the Royal Astronomical Society's Winton Award for 2022 for research by a post-doctoral fellow in astronomy whose career has shown the most promising development.

Research interests

Astrophysics
Supermassive Black Holes
Galaxy evolution
Black Hole Growth

Selected publications

Kiloparsec-scale AGN outflows and feedback in merger-free galaxies

Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 91̽»¨ University Press 507:3 (2021) 3985-3997
Rj Smethurst, Bd Simmons, A Coil, Cj Lintott, W Keel, Kl Masters, E Glikman, Gck Leung, J Shanahan, Il Garland

Secularly powered outflows from AGN: the dominance of non-merger driven supermassive black hole growth

Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 91̽»¨ University Press 489:3 (2019) 4014-4031
RJ Smethurst, BD Simmons, Christopher Lintott, J Shanahan

Supermassive black holes in disk-dominated galaxies outgrow their bulges and co-evolve with their host galaxies

Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 91̽»¨ University Press 470:2 (2017) 1559-1569
BD Simmons, RJ Smethurst, Christopher Lintott

SNITCH: seeking a simple, informative star formation history inference tool

Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 91̽»¨ University Press 484:3 (2019) 3590-3603
Rebecca J Smethurst, M Merrifield, Christopher Lintott, KL Masters, BD Simmons, A Fraser-Mckelvie, T Peterken, M Boquien, RA Riffel, N Drory
132285
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