Rutgers University Astrophysics Seminar

The chemistry of gas and stars in galaxies connects many seemingly disparate areas of astrophysics, from planet formation and stellar evolution to the enrichment and physical state of the circumgalactic and intergalactic media. Because heavy elements are synthesized in stars of different masses on different formation timescales, the abundance of these elements in and around galaxies provides a record of past star formation. In the 1990s, the Hubble Space Telescope revealed a diverse population of galaxies in the early universe; over the last decade, large near-infrared spectroscopic surveys using ground-based facilities have allowed astronomers to study these nascent galaxies in detail for the first time. I will review recent advances in this area and introduce a novel technique I developed for determining the chemistry of young galaxies, particularly those forming during "Cosmic Noon," the period 8-12 Gyr ago when roughly half of all the stars in the universe were created. This work has helped place such galaxies in context with their progenitors and descendants and provided new constraints on the physical processes that regulate galaxy growth. I will conclude by discussing my plans to build on this foundation and use observations with next-generation facilities like the James Webb Space Telescope and the Prime Focus Spectrograph on the Subaru Telescope to study galaxy evolution across most of cosmic history.