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APPLICATION DEADLINE: February 13, 2024.

Brief Description

Dr. Gregg Wade seeks a motivated undergraduate student to pursue a summer internship within his research group at Royal Military College of Canada. The successful candidate will assist with a project in the field of stellar astrophysics, as described below.
The duration of the internship is expected to be 16 weeks beginning in early May. While there is some flexibility in working arrangements, students are expected to be available to work on-site for the duration of internship. Students must be eligible to work in Canada, and they must be currently enrolled in a full-time bachelor’s degree at a Canadian university. Students from Physics, Engineering Physics, Astronomy are particularly encouraged to apply.

The weekly stipend will be $562.50, for a total of $9000 for 16 weeks.

Applications should include the following documents

• A most recent unofficial transcript (including Fall 2023 term marks);
• A one-page letter that states your interest in the position, you preferred project, and highlights any relevant qualifications such as previous research experience, organisational contributions or initiatives undertaken, education and outreach experience, and/or technical skills (such as computer programming or circuit design);
• A CV that includes relevant employment experience as well as the name of at least one individual who could provide a reference for this position upon request.

Questions regarding the internship and application process should be directed to Dr. Wade at wade-g@rmc.ca. Applications should be submitted by email to that address, and the title of that email should be “Summer Research Internship”

Spectroscopic modelling of classical Cepheids

Classical Cepheids are young, evolved stars that pulsate radially with periods of days to weeks. Cepheids famously obey the Leavitt Law, a strict period-luminosity relation making them instrumental in setting the cosmic distance ladder. As "cosmic yardsticks" Cepheids are used to measure extra-galactic distances and the expansion rate of the Universe. However, many aspects of Cepheids remain poorly understood including their evolutionary history, atmospheric dynamics and magnetic properties. During pulsation Cepheid atmospheres can move at speeds up to 100,000 km/h, covering distances several times the diameter of the sun. As a result, Cepheid pulsation distorts the morphology of observed spectra and magnetic signatures, providing a complicated modelling problem. The successful applicant will perform spectroscopic analysis and modelling on existing data sets to infer Cepheid atmospheric properties such as velocity gradients, shocks, turbulence and rotational velocities.

Spectroscopic and photometric variability of massive stars

Massive O-type stars are hot, young stars with masses tens of times that of the sun. While massive stars are rare stellar objects, they significantly influence their stellar environments through strong stellar winds and their end-of-life explosions as supernovae. A small subset of massive stars are known to host strong dipolar magnetic fields which channel the star's wind into a dense magnetosphere. The signatures of physical processes are observed in the spectra and light curves of massive stars including magnetic fields and stochastic-low frequency variability. It is predicted that magnetic fields can inhibit O star stochastic variability which is believed to arise from sub-surface convective layers or deep in the stellar core. Therefore, magnetic O stars provide unique laboratories to probe massive star interiors. The successful applicant will analyze existing spectroscopic and photometric data sets of massive stars to answer research questions related to massive star magnetism and variability. The successful candidate will have the opportunity to work with diverse data sets including high cadence photometry from the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) and spectra from ground based telescopes such as the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope (CFHT).

Magnetic studies of evolved stars with SPIRou

Magnetic fields impact the evolution and behaviour of stars across a wide range of spectral types. Over the past decade large spectropolarimetric studies have provided a wealth of information about the magnetic properties of core hydrogen-burning stars on or near the main sequence. However, little is known about the magnetic properties of evolved stars in the transitionary stages between the main sequence and the red-giant branch. During this stage of evolution, the star's radius will increase by an order of magnitude, leading to a substantial decrease in the magnetic flux. This makes surface magnetic fields in evolved stars challenging to detect using traditional optical spectropolarimeters. Future large-scale magnetic studies of evolved stars will need to make use of alternative instrumentation. One possible solution is to perform observations at near-infrared wavelengths where the stellar flux is higher and spectral line transitions are more magnetically sensitive. The successful applicant will perform a feasibility study to determine the suitability of using the SPIRou near-infrared spectropolarimeter at CFHT to perform large monitoring studies of evolved stars. The work may include identifying suitable targets from diverse stellar classes (e.g. Supergiants, classical Cepheids, Type II Cepheids and RR Lyraes), synthesizing polarized spectra with existing codes, conducting exposure time calculations and designing an observing program.