Aparna Venkatesan headshot

Aparna Venkatesan

Professor

Full-Time Faculty
Harney Science Center G30

Biography

Aparna Venkatesan is an astronomer in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of San Francisco. She works on studies of the first stars and quasars in the universe, and on numerous cultural astronomy and space policy projects. She also serves as past co-Chair of the American Astronomical Society's Committee to Protect Astronomy and the Space Environment (COMPASSE). Dr. Venkatesan has been recognized internationally for her research and leadership, featured widely in the media, and received numerous prizes and awards. She is deeply committed to developing the future workforce of astronomy and STEM, and is active in developing co-created scientific partnerships with Indigenous communities worldwide. Dr. Venkatesan has worked with nearly two dozen USF undergraduates on award-winning projects, with over half those students going onto STEM careers. 

In recent years, Dr. Venkatesan has been leading work in dark-sky advocacy and developing protections for darkness and space as an environment for science, sky traditions, language and heritage. She recently created the neologism "noctalgia" with Dr. John Barentine to express “sky grief” for the accelerating loss of the home environment of our shared skies. Noctalgia (sky grief) struck an interdisciplinary chord globally, generating numerous international art exhibits commemorating dark skies, dozens of media, book and podcast mentions, poetry, musical compositions in popular and black metal genres, craft beer, a new sign created in British Sign Language, and more. With Dr. Barentine and colleagues, Dr. Venkatesan co-founded the Center for Space Environmentalism in spring 2025 to support academic inquiry and social advocacy focused on the protection of the space environment.

Dr. Venkatesan speaks a few times a month at conferences, K-12 schools, US and global institutions, amateur astronomy groups and university guest lectures. In 2024 and 2025, she gave presentations at the University of Hawaii, the Indigenous Education Institute, Princeton University, DARPA (US Department of Defense), invited plenary at the American Astronomical Society 2024 summer conference, interdisciplinary astronomy-art-storytelling events at the San Francisco Exploratorium, the 2024 United Nations General Assembly Science Summit, Dark Sky West Marin, Penn State, National Academy of Sciences, and numerous regional astronomical societies.

Expertise

  • Cosmology
  • Cultural astronomy
  • Dark sky advocacy
  • Impacts of satellite constellations
  • STEM partnerships with indigenous communities, indigenous knowledge

Research Areas

  • Cosmology (First stars and quasars, earliest galaxies, cosmic reionization)
  • Space policy and impacts of satellite constellations
  • Legal-policy protections for space as an environment
  • Cultural astronomy
  • Indigenous knowledge

Appointments

  • Co-founder of the Center for Space Environmentalism, spring 2025

  • Co-Chair of the American Astronomical Society Committee for the Protection of Astronomy and the Space Environment (AAS COMPASSE; spring 2022 - summer 2025). Continuing as past co-Chair of COMPASSE, 2025-26

  • Co-Director of the Tracy Seeley Center for Teaching Excellence (Jan. 2022 - May 2025)

  • Advisor for the 2023-25 NSF-funded project The Cultural Roots of STEM: A Synthesis of Non-Western STEM Learning Paradigms

  • Member of the AAS Committee for the Status of Minorities in Astronomy (2015–19), and the AAS Committee for the Status of Women in Astronomy (2016–19, co-Chair for 2016–17)

Education

  • MS and PhD in Astronomy and Astrophysics, University of Chicago
  • BA in Astronomy, Cornell University

Prior Experience

  • Postdoctoral Research Associate and NSF Astronomy and Astrophysics Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Colorado, Boulder

Awards & Distinctions

  • USF/USF Full-time Faculty Association Distinguished Research Award for outstanding research contributions to an academic discipline (2024)
  • USF Post-sabbatical merit award for exceptional productivity in research over sabbatical year (awarded in 2023 for 2019-20)
  • Lead USF Faculty Member in 22-institution consortium, The Undergraduate ALFALFA Team (UAT), awarded three 3-year NSF collaborative grants (2021–2024, 2016– 2019 and 2012–2015)
  • Research Corporation Cottrell Scholar (2018) and Cottrell College Science Award (2010-13)
  • University of San Francisco Awards: Arthur Furst Award (2018), Co-recipient of the College of Arts and Sciences Collective Achievement Award for Supporting Women in STEM Fields (2018), Dean's Scholar Award (2013), and Jesuit Foundation Grant (2012)

Selected Publications

Media

Recent Podcasts