I am a first year PhD student at Trinity College Dublin in the field of planet formation (trying to figure out how planets are made) under Dr. Luca Matrá, specifically working on debris disks, analogues of the asteroid and Kuiper belt in our own solar system. I did my MSc with Dr. Christian Ginski at the University of Galway within the same field, but instead working with younger disks (younger is a bit misleading as these disks are up to 10 million years old) called protoplanetary disks, named for their ability to form planets.

Personally, I come from Laois and spent the last 5 years living in Galway. I'm hoping to continue my research past my PhD in the field of planet formation, and to be able to stay and continue it within Ireland would be my dream, assuming I can find somewhere to rent within Ireland…