Amalie Stokholm

Postdoctoral researcher in Astrophysics

About

Profile picture of Dr. Amalie Stokholm
Hi! I'm Amalie and I am a research fellow in astrophysics.

My main scientific focus is on Galactic archaeology, which involves uncovering the history and evolution of the Milky Way by examining the characteristics and distributions of its stars. I am part of the CartographY group at University of Birmingham.

My research focuses on utilizing stellar inference in various contexts, particularly on stellar populations. This involves combining the orbital and chemical data of stars with ages determined through the study of stellar pulsations, known as asteroseismology. The integration of these observations enables us to conduct detailed analyses of the Milky Way.

Precise and accurate stellar inference is key to my work. I am part of the core developement team of BAyesian STellar Algorithm (BASTA), which is a flexible pipeline for the inference of stellar properties, such as the masses, radii, and ages of stars.

When I am not studying stars, I enjoy running, playing chess, watching musicals, and puzzling with coding projects.

Currently, I am spending a lot of my spare time on solving the puzzle known as Cain's Jawbone. If you are also struggling with the references to Kipling, Wilde, and Sherlock Holmes, and the many Henrys, feel free to write me.

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k stars analyzed

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(co-)authored papers

Science

A unified exploration of the chronology of the Galaxy

In this study, we delve into the complex structures of the Milky Way, leveraging recent advancements in data quality for a large number of stars. Our aim is to use unsupervised methods to unravel the intricate components associated with the Galaxy’s formation and evolution. We determine stellar properties for 21,076 red giants, spanning distances of 2–15 kiloparsecs from the Galactic center, establishing the most extensive sample of red giants with precisely measured asteroseismic ages.

By employing Gaussian mixture models as an unsupervised clustering technique, we explore the Galactic disc’s different stellar structures incorporating chemical, kinematic, and age-related data. The outcome reveals four distinct physical components within the stellar disc: the thin disc, the thick disc, the stellar halo, and an interesting kinematically heated thin disc component.

Moreover, we identify a potential age asymmetry between the Northern and Southern hemispheres of the Galactic disc. We also quantify the vertical and radial age gradients of the Galactic disc by extending asteroseismic ages to greater distances than previous investigations.

Read our entire study here

Science

The subgiant HR 7322 as an asteroseismic benchmark star

HR 7322 is a bright star that is slightly more evolved than our Sun in the phase of its evolution known as the subgiant phase. This is from an evolutionary point of view a rather quick phase, lasting only a small fraction of its life as a hydrogen-fusion main-sequence star but during which fundamental structural changes occur in the star.

Bright subgiant stars are interesting as they can be studied using different methods. This makes it possible to test predictions from methods that depend more strongly on our current theory of stellar models against less model-dependent methods.

In this study, we compare the stellar radius from interferometry, which is more-or-less a geometric method of deriving the radius and thus depend very little on the stellar models, to stellar radii estimates from the scaling relations and estimates from detailed stellar modelling, which by nature has a high model-dependence.

Read our entire study here

Recent publications


A full list of my publications can be found at my ADS library.

Recent blog posts

How to use icons from `font-awesome` as markers in `matplotlib` My academic iPad or how to link Zotero and Obsidian My Obsidian Vault Low-cost first steps to improve equality in a workspace Actually good things on the Internet

A full list of all blog posts can be found at my blog.

Outreach & Press

Outreach and talks

  • Invited guest speaker at Astronomy in the City event in Birmingham, speaking about The Story Written in the Stars.
  • Invited lecturer in the lecture series Universets gåder (en: Riddles of the Universe) at Folkeuniversitetet on the topic of Hvordan er vores egen Galakse blevet til? (en: How has our own Galaxy come to be?. Lectures in Copenhagen, Aarhus, Herning, and Kolding.
  • Speaker at Astronomy on Tap Aarhus, a series of outreach events taking place downtown at a pub bringing cosmic science to the people by explaining complex astronomy topics in clear presentations in the comfortable environment of a bar.

In the media