Executive Committee

Rodrigo completed his undergraduate studies in physics at Universidad de San Carlos de Guatemala. He did his master's and doctoral studies in astrophysics at the Instituto de Astronomía-UNAM, Mexico. He subsequently completed postdoctoral studies at the National Institute of Space Sciences in Brazil. His studies have been mainly in gamma-ray astrophysics, particularly in gamma-ray bursts. He is also currently working on the study of Blazars, a type of active galactic nuclei, which constitute the brightest objects in the sky in gamma rays. Rodrigo is a member of the Academy of Medical, Physical and Natural Sciences of Guatemala and the Guatemalan Association of Physics. He has also worked on popularization of science through different conference cycles and is the national contact for Guatemala of the Astronomy Outreach Contact (AOD) of the International Astronomical Union and national delegate of Asteroid Day.

Paola Oliva-Altamirano, Honduran, based in Australia. She did her PhD and Post-doctorate at Swinburne University of Technology, she is an expert in spectroscopy, IFUs, and statistical analysis using SDSS data. Her field of study is Galaxy formation and evolution. Currently, she has transitioned to the artificial intelligence space, she works for Our Community building machine learning models for text classification.

Born in Guatemala City. He did his studies in Physics at Universidad de San Carlos de Guatemala. He completed his Master's and Doctorate studies in Astrophysics at the Institute of Radio Astronomy and Astrophysics of the UNAM Campus Morelia, and from 2020 he is doing a postdoctoral stay at the University of Chile. His field of research is studying the properties of gas and dust in protoplanetary discs from a theoretical point of view in order to explain interferometric observations, mainly in discs with vortex structures and / or rings, where the grains of dust can accumulate and grow.

Edoardo Tescari is a Research Data Specialist in the Melbourne Data Analytics Platform (MDAP) team at the University of Melbourne. Edoardo completed his Master’s degree in astronomy at the University of Padua and his PhD in physics at the University of Trieste in Italy. After working as a postdoctoral fellow in Trieste and at the Astrophysics Division CEA-Saclay (Paris), he moved to Australia. Before joining MDAP, he worked for six years as a postdoctoral fellow in the School of Physics at the University of Melbourne. His research involved running, post-processing and analysing large-scale cosmological simulations with the goal of studying the formation and evolution of galaxies and interplay between galaxies and the intergalactic medium. Edoardo has extensive experience in the use of multi-core computer clusters, parallel computational techniques and management of large data sets. In his current role within MDAP, Edoardo has been collaborating with academics from different faculties and domains on a range of research projects, including climate modelling, biodiversity and automated agriculture.

Born in San José, Costa Rica. After finishing school, I moved to the United States. I took English classes at Northern Virginia Community College, then took my bachelor's degree in mathematics at the University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill. I received my master's degree in physics from Fisk University in May 2018. Now, I am a doctoral student in astrophysics at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee. My research area is the theory of galaxy formation and evolution. Specifically, I study the morphology of galaxies (whether elliptical or spiral), their star formation rate, stellar mass, and mass of dark matter taking into account the environment / density where they "live" using cosmological simulations. Also, I am part of the council of representatives of the National Astronomy Consortium (NAC) at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO), co-leader of the Central American-Caribbean Bridge in Astrophysics, and writer in Astrobitos.

Hondurean, I did my studies in physics at Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Honduras (UNAH) from 2005 to 2011, during this period I had the opportunity to participate in different schools and workshops in different Latin American countries that allowed me to make links with Dr Louise Edwards (Cal Poly) to work my degree thesis studying emission lines in AGNs. I was also part of the Physics students association and was part of the organizing committee of the Central American and Caribbean Physics Course 2011 (CURCCAF). Then I worked as an assistant professor at Centro Regional del Litoral Atlántico (CURLA), in La Ceiba, Honduras. In which I developed academic and research activities in the area of ​​earth sciences. In 2016 I began my postgraduate studies at the Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., receiving a master's degree in May 2018. I am currently in the 4th year of the doctorate. My research areas are: infrared astronomy, evolution of galaxies, characterization of gas and dust in galaxies, star formation in galaxies.

Obtainned the Physics degree at Universidad de Costa Rica. Master of Science student with a specialization in Astrophysics from the Instituto Nacional de Astrofísica, Óptica y Electrónica of Mexico. I have worked on star formation projects, mainly in millimeter and radio wavelengths, as well as simulations for the study of galaxy morphology. Co-leader of the Central American-Caribbean Bridge in Astrophysics group.