PATRICIA TISSERA

I am a full Professor at the Institute of Astrophysics, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile,  the leader of the Computational Galaxy Formation research line. Our research line is formed by young scientists and PhD students, working within strong collaboration networks. Our research is focused on creatively questioning the physical processes that govern the formation and evolution of galaxies. For this purpose, we develop our own numerical modeling and simulations.

 

I got my first degree in Astronomy at the  Universidad Nacional de Córdoba (UNC) in Argentina, in December 1990. Later I finished my PhD in Astronomy at UNC in May 1995, after visiting the University of Oxford during 1994. 

 

In 1995 I spent a year as an academic visitor at University of Oxford, where I continued working with my own simulations and finished the implementation of a code to combine the population synthesis of Bruzual and Charlot (1993) with the information of the simulated galaxies. This implementation allowed the estimation of magnitudes and luminosities for virtual galaxies, and it was among the first ones to be published in 1997, with its preliminary results presented in 1994 in the First UNAM-Cray supercomputer conference.

 

After my PhD I spent two years as a postdoctoral fellow at Universidad Autónoma de Madrid (Spain) and as an academic visitor at Imperial College of Science, Medicine and Technology (UK). In 1998 I returned to Argentina as an assistant researcher in the Consejo Nacional de Ciencia and Technology (CONICET) to start a new line of research at the Institute of Astronomy and Space Physics (IAFE) in Buenos Aires. CONICET gave the opportunity to develop as a researcher and it was an honor to be part of its community.

 

By the end of 1998, I began working on chemical evolution. The goal was to include in more detail the chemical enrichment by Supernova II and Ia and take into account the metallicity dependence of the cooling processes in a hydrodynamical code. Our first paper on this numerical implementation came out in 2001. We continued working on different aspects of galaxy formation using chemical patterns to confront models with observations.

 

Numerical Astrophysics settled as a solid and active research line at IAFE. Several students got their PhD and undergraduate thesis in this area. In 2001, I was awarded a multi-institutional fund to build our first Beowulf cluster.This very hectic year for all who lived in Argentina. However, I enjoyed working with my students and team to overcome the large difficulties related to building our cluster. 
 

Our group has always been part of international collaboration and networks such as the LENAC network (FP7), the LACEGAL I and II (Horizon 2020), ITN Cosmocomp,  Southern Astrophysics Network (Argentina-Chile-Brasil) and bilateral collaborations with Mexico, Germany and Brasil. Many students began their professional life with us and have continued to progress successfully in the academia and the  private sector.

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Currently, I am a member of the Institute of Astrophysics at Pontificia Universidad Católica (Chile), where I started in 2020 after working as a professor at Universidad Andres Bello (Chile). At PUC, I am starting once again a research line on galaxy formation and evolution using numerical simulations. These are very exciting times to work in Astrophysics, in an era  where amazing discoveries  about the origin of our Galaxy and the Universe have the potential to astonish us and open new doors to understand their origin and evolution of the cosmos. Undoubtedly numerical simulations are powerful tools to contribute to this quest.

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During my career I have had the opportunity to work with outstanding students, something I cultivate to this day and am confident shall remain in the future. I am proud to say they all are successfully working in academia, and that about half of them have been female. I have also had the opportunity to work with many researchers and to publish papers with only female authors. Indeed, about 17 percent of  my refereed papers are signed by only female colleagues.  I hope this inspires the new generations, in spite of unfair situations,  to keep moving forward, taking any chance they get to develop their independence and leadership. I have personally witnessed positive changes regarding the role of women in science since I started my career. I’m certain this is a trend we shall all commit to drive forward.