Dr. Toby Brown

Astronomer (staff)

Herzberg Astronomy and Astrophysics Research Centre
National Research Council of Canada
Victoria, BC

Email: Tobias.Brown __at__ nrc-cnrc.gc.ca
Personal Website: www.drtobybrown.com

Former Positions:

  • Plaskett Fellow: Herzberg Astronomy & Astrophysics Research Centre, National Research Council of Canada (2021 – 2024)
  • Research Officer: Herzberg Astronomy & Astrophysics Research Centre, National Research Council of Canada (2020 – 2021)
  • Postdoctoral Fellow: McMaster University (2017 – 2020)

Research:

My research focuses on the intricate relationships between the gas in galaxies —essential for star formation — and their stellar, star formation, and chemical properties.

Specializing in the analysis of large multi-wavelength datasets, I aim to understand galaxy populations as a whole. Additionally, I contribute to building digital infrastructure that supports astronomy research, making it more accessible and efficient.

I lead the VERTICO Survey (Brown et al. 2021), a completed ALMA Cycle 7 Large Program that has mapped the molecular gas, as the raw fuel for star formation, in 51 Virgo Cluster galaxies with the aim of revealing the effects of environment on galaxies’ gas content in unprecedented detail.

I am in the management group of MAUVE, a large program using the MUSE instrument on the Very Large Telescope. This project uses incredible data to understand the influence of the environment on the gas-star formation cycle of cluster galaxies during their infall.

Publications:

An up-to-date list of my publication can be found on ADS. These papers have collected over 950 citations, with a field-weighted-citation-impact of 1.7 (first author FWCI = 2.6) and h-index = 15.

Technical Contributions

As a scientist, I guide the development of the Canadian Square Kilometre Array Regional Centre with the goal of providing Canadian and international users with access to the SKA data. The establishment of this centre requires computing, network and storage infrastructure services two orders of magnitude more powerful than those currently existing in Canada.

Selected Service Roles:

  • Management Group & Data Products WG Lead, MAUVE MUSE LP (2022 – present)
  • Principle Investigator, VERTICO Collaboration (2019 – present)
  • Survey Coordinator, DOWSING JCMT Large Program (2019 – present)
  • Science Team and Galaxies Working Group Member, CASTOR (2022 – present)
  • SKA HI Galaxy Science Working Group Member, SKAO (2018 – present)
  • Science Council Lead, NRC-HAA (2022 – present)
  • Principle Investigator, ARCADE ALMA Development Study (2020 – 2021)
  • GAMAICA (GAlaxy MApping Instrument at Calar Alto) Science Team (2020 – 2021)

Survey Memberships:

  • LSST Data Rights Holder
  • WALLABY SKA Pathfinder Survey
  • MAUVE-ALMA
  • MAUVE MUSE/VLT Large Program
  • KILOGAS Survey
  • VERTICO ALMA Large Program (PI)
  • DOWSING JCMT Large Program
  • JINGLE JCMT Large Program

Information for Students and Postdocs

At the Herzberg Astronomy and Astrophysics Research Centre (NRC-HAA), we conduct world-class research across a broad range of astrophysics. We have access to current and future premier facilities like SKA, CHORD, ALMA, Rubin Observatory, Gemini Observatory, Canada France Hawaii Telescope, and state-of-the-art labs. We are also home to the Canadian Astronomy Data Centre which provides leading data services and cloud computing.

We offer four postdoctoral fellowship programs: the Plaskett Fellowship, Covington Fellowship, and Instrument Science Fellowship, plus an open-field postdoctoral competition that NRC runs annually.

If you are interested in working at NRC-HAA please feel free to contact me.