Biography
Professor French received her SB degrees in Physics and Earth Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences in 2011 from MIT, and her PhD in Astronomy and Astrophysics from the University of Arizona in 2017. She was a Hubble Postdoctoral Fellow at the Carnegie Observatories in Pasadena, CA. Professor French joined the faculty at UIUC in 2020.
Research Interests
Galaxy evolution
Transient astronomy
Optical and radio observations
Research Description
Professor French uses multi-wavelength observations to study how galaxies evolve over time and co-evolve with their supermassive black holes.
External Links
Recent Publications
Chen, P., Dong, S., Stritzinger, M. D., Holmbo, S., Strader, J., Kochanek, C. S., Peng, E. W., Benetti, S., Bersier, D., Brownsberger, S., Buckley, D. A. H., Gromadzki, M., Moran, S., Pastorello, A., Aydi, E., Bose, S., Connor, T., Boutsia, K., Di Mille, F. D., ... Swihart, S. J. (2020). The Most Rapidly Declining Type i Supernova 2019bkc/ATLAS19dqr. Astrophysical Journal Letters, 889(1), [L6]. https://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/ab62a4
French, K. D., Wevers, T., Law-Smith, J., Graur, O., & Zabludoff, A. I. (2020). The Host Galaxies of Tidal Disruption Events. Space Science Reviews, 216(3), [32]. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11214-020-00657-y
French, K. D., Arcavi, I., Zabludoff, A. I., Stone, N., Hiramatsu, D., Van Velzen, S., McCully, C., & Jiang, N. (2020). The Structure of Tidal Disruption Event Host Galaxies on Scales of Tens to Thousands of Parsecs. Astrophysical Journal, 891(1), [93]. https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ab7450
Holoien, T. W. S., Vallely, P. J., Auchettl, K., Stanek, K. Z., Kochanek, C. S., French, K. D., Prieto, J. L., Shappee, B. J., Brown, J. S., Fausnaugh, M. M., Dong, S., Thompson, T. A., Bose, S., Neustadt, J. M. M., Cacella, P., Brimacombe, J., Kendurkar, M. R., Beaton, R. L., Boutsia, K., ... Strader, J. (2019). Discovery and Early Evolution of ASASSN-19bt, the First TDE Detected by TESS. Astrophysical Journal, 883(2), [111]. https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ab3c66
Hosseinzadeh, G., McCully, C., Zabludoff, A. I., Arcavi, I., French, K. D., Howell, D. A., Berger, E., & Hiramatsu, D. (2019). Type Ibn Supernovae May not all Come from Massive Stars. Astrophysical Journal Letters, 871(1), [L9]. https://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/aafc61