Aparna Venkatesan

Aparna Venkatesan is a cosmologist working on studies of “first-light” sources in the universe. She also works actively in cultural astronomy and space policy. She is recognized internationally for her research and DEI leadership, featured widely in the media, and received numerous prizes and awards. Dr. Venkatesan is deeply committed to increasing the participation and retention of underrepresented groups in astronomy and the sciences, and is active in developing co-created scientific partnerships with Indigenous communities worldwide. Dr. Venkatesan has worked with numerous undergraduate students in her research; 90% have been women and/or minorities, and about half have gone on to STEM careers. In the past few years, Dr. Venkatesan has been leading work in dark-sky advocacy and preserving space as a scientific, environmental and cultural resource for humanity, given the growing privatization of space and the rapidly rising impacts of satellite constellations in low-Earth orbits. She has been featured dozens of times in recent years in major news publications, media, and events. She serves as a co-director of the Tracy Seeley Center for Teaching Excellence.

• Cosmology
• Cultural Astronomy
• Dark Sky Advocacy
• Impacts of Satellite Constellations
• STEM partnerships with Indigenous communities, Indigenous Knowledge

• Cosmology (First Stars and Quasars, Reionization)
• Space Policy and Impacts of Satellite Constellations
• Cultural Astronomy, Indigenous Knowledge
• Astrophysics

• Co-Director of the Tracy Seeley Center for Teaching Excellence (2022-25)
• Co-Chair of the American Astronomical Society Committee for the Protection of Astronomy and the Space Environment (AAS COMPASSE; 2022-24)
• 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)
• Chair, Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of San Francisco (2014-16)

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

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

• Lead USF Faculty Member in consortium, The Undergraduate ALFALFA Team (UAT), awarded three 3-year NSF collaborative grants for $128,391 (2021–2024), $215,316 (2016– 2019) and $437,883 (2012–2015)
• One of VICE Media’s Humans of the Year, 2020
• Research Corporation Cottrell Scholar (2018) and Cottrell College Science Award (2010-13)
• University of San Francisco: 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)

• A. Venkatesan 2023, Stewardship of space as shared environment and heritage and J. Barentine et al 2023, Aggregate effects of proliferating LEO objects and implications for astronomical data lost in the noise. Featured in a Nature Astronomy collection on Dark Skies; USF Media Release. 

• J. C. Barentine at al. 2022, Reimagining Near-Earth Space Policy in a Post-COVID World, Virginia Policy Review.

• L. Y. Aaron Yung et al. 2021, Semi-analytic forecasts for JWST - V. AGN luminosity functions and helium reionization at z = 2–7, MNRAS, 508, 2706-2729
• A. Venkatesan et al. 2021, Community Engagement Working Group Report from the SATCON2 Workshop, 55 pages, Bulletin of the AAS 
• A. Venkatesan et al. 2020, Invited Perspective in Nature Astronomy, The Impact of Satellite Constellations on Space as an Ancestral Global Commons, 4, 1043–1048
• L. Y. Aaron Yung et al. 2020, Semi-analytic forecasts for JWST - IV. Implications for cosmic reionization and LyC escape fraction, MNRAS, 496, 4574-92
• A. Venkatesan et al. 2019, Invited Comment in Nature Astronomy, Inclusive Practices with Indigenous Knowledge, 3, 1035-1037
• M. Dijkstra, M. Gronke & A. Venkatesan 2016, The LyA-LyC Connection: Evidence for an Enhanced Contribution of UV-faint Galaxies to Cosmic Reionization, Ap.J., 828, 71

• Physics Today, Scientific American, Science, Science again, The Economist, Impakter, VICE, Discover Magazine, New Scientist and WIRED magazine

Recent and Upcoming Talks

• The Cultural Relevance of Dark and Quiet Sky Protection for the International Astronomical Union

• Isaac Asimov Memorial Debate: Space Pollution with Neil deGrasse Tyson

• After Dark: Moon Musings, an interdisciplinary science-art-storytelling event at the San Francisco Exploratorium

• Sustainable Use of Orbital Space for Science and Society at the 2023 AAAS meeting

• Who Owns the Night Sky? for the International Dark-Sky Association

Recent Podcasts

• 2023 Women's History Month feature in USF student newspaper-created Fog Pod
• Green Dreamer
• Science Friday
• Goodbye darkness, my old friend—satellite constellations are alarming astronomers, The Economist — Shortlisted for Best Podcast of 2022 by the Association of British Science Writers