Astro Seminar Series - VIA ZOOM

Julie Hlavacek-Larrondo is a Canada Research Chair and an associate professor of physics at the Université de Montréal. She is an expert on the most massive black holes in the Universe and her work is revealing how these black holes act as the beating heart of galaxies, ultimately shaping the properties of galaxies throughout cosmic time. More recently, her work has focused on harnessing the power of machine learning to better understand the mysteries behind black holes. After completing her bachelor's and master's degrees at the Université de Montréal, Julie Hlavacek-Larrondo obtained a Ph.D. in astrophysics at the University of Cambridge followed by a postdoctoral fellowship at Stanford University as a NASA Einstein Fellow. She is also a strong advocate for diversity and co-founded the Quebec initiative Parité sciences.

Title: New results about black hole feedback in galaxy clusters 

Abstract: Contrary to what their name suggests, black holes are not empty space; they are the most extreme objects in the Universe, so powerful that nothing can escape them, not even light. Filled with an exceptional amount of energy, they can easily destroy entire galaxies. The goal of my work is to understand the most massive black holes, the titans among giants. In this talk,  I will review the current state of this field while focusing on how these objects, and especially their powerful radio jets, shape the properties of galaxies throughout cosmic time. In particular, I will demonstrate that clusters of galaxies play a pivotal role in our understanding of mechanical/jet-mode black hole feedback processes, as well as in multiphase gas surrounding galaxies. I will also present new results on how machine learning can (and will) play a vital role in our understanding of black hole feedback for the next decades.