Career Profile: Lena Danaia and Inquiry-Based Science Education

The AAS Committee on the Status of Women in Astronomy has compiled dozens of interviews highlighting the diversity of career trajectories available to astronomers, planetary scientists, etc. The interviews share advice and lessons learned from individuals on those paths.

Lena Danaia grew up surrounded by her grandfather’s astronomy magazines. She read through them and chatted with him about the stars and, like many of us, enjoyed gazing up at the night sky.

When Danaia went to college, she focused on becoming a teacher. While in the teacher-training program, she decided to do an honors year. She remembered how much she enjoyed reading about astronomy and her talks with her grandfather, and chose to get involved with the astronomy program. She had the opportunity to do an education-related project with a remote telescope. This reignited her passion for astronomy.

Courtesy of Lena Danaia

Danaia taught school in the United Kingdom and Australia before going through the external process of applying for a PhD scholarship program, where she chose to focus on astronomy education. Her doctoral project centered on student education in astronomy and science. This set the theme for Danaia’s work going forward—she continues to find the links between astronomy and student education.

Danaia is currently an associate professor in the School of Education at Charles Sturt University. She has consulted with many astronomers on the educational aspects of their work. “They need to see if what they’re doing is having an impact.” Danaia assesses how that work is impacting students and teachers and provides education on how to run a program. She has served as the chief investigator on several large-scale research projects. 

One of these projects is “Space to Grow,” a program focused on students in grades 9-12 in Australia. One of the main goals of the three-year project was to develop and implement a professional learning program for science teachers. The program focused on building teacher confidence and competence in using observational data from telescopes in the classroom. In grade 10, Australian students must choose whether they will continue higher-level science courses, and this program was designed to address the falling rate of students interested in these classes, including physics. 

Courtesy of Our Solar Siblings (OSS)

Students used sets of images from telescopes to analyze an open cluster of stars, calculating its distance and age, and learning physics and astronomy concepts like the inverse square law and stellar parallax. While Danaia didn’t write the educational materials, she led the team measuring the impact of the project on students and teachers. Danaia and her team published a review of the Space to Grow project in the 2012 Astronomy Education Review.

Another collaborative educational project Danaia is involved with is “Our Solar Siblings.” OSS is an inquiry-based project for high school-level astronomy that gets students out of the textbook and into real data. The program updates curriculum and materials in accordance with teacher feedback and student responses to the course.

Danaia says of this and other projects, “Most of my work has been collaborative…making sure it’s accessible and will have impact, and asking ‘What’s the benefit for our students and teachers here?’ I always try to report back to our schools so it gets back to them.”

Besides Danaia’s involvement in projects like these, she also teaches research at her university and supervises PhD students. She is also the chief investigator on several other projects, including “Little Scientists,” a program that helps early childhood educators implement inquiry-based STEM projects into their lessons.

Courtesy of Our Solar Siblings (OSS)

When asked about the challenges of working on programs like this, and in astronomy education in general, Danaia said, “Being female working in this space—lots of career interruptions—many of my colleagues haven’t had that. I find some of my colleagues and I put our hands up for many things—playing catch-up in the field—the pressure to volunteer to do so.”

Lena Danaia has published extensively on inquiry-based education in science classrooms, as well as professional development for science teachers, with a focus on using astronomy as a key component. Find out more about Danaia’s research at https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Lena-Danaia. 

Guest Post: Invisible Journeys: The Struggles and Strengths of Displaced Women Scholars

Today, we welcome guest blogger Dr. Encieh Erfani, who is currently a researcher at the University of Mainz, Germany, and who writes passionately about science communication, as well as the struggles of women and displaced scholars in academia.

Invisible Journeys: The Struggles and Strengths of Displaced Women Scholars

By Encieh Erfani, Ph.D.

When I first heard the term “displaced scholar”, it sounded abstract, as if it belonged in a policy document rather than in someone’s life story. Yet for thousands of academics around the world, including myself, displacement is not abstract at all. It is a lived reality that reshapes careers, families, and identities. For women in particular, displacement magnifies pre-existing inequalities, creating a double burden: surviving exile while navigating the gendered challenges of academic life.

Today, as conflicts, authoritarianism, and crises push more scholars into exile, it is time to reflect on who these displaced women scholars are, what obstacles they face, and how the scientific community can respond.

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Who Are Displaced Women Scholars?

There is no single, universally agreed-upon definition of displaced or at-risk scholars. Broadly, they are academics who are forced to leave their home institutions and, often, their home countries because of political repression, conflict, discrimination, or threats to their safety.

While all displaced scholars experience professional and personal upheaval, women often face unique challenges. Many juggle responsibilities as caregivers while trying to rebuild their academic careers in new and uncertain environments. Others encounter cultural or institutional barriers that make it harder to re-enter academia abroad. And because women are already underrepresented in many STEM fields, their forced displacement silences voices that are already too few.

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Photo Courtesy of Encieh Erfani, Ph.D.

The Challenges of Displacement

The barriers facing displaced women scholars are complex and interconnected. Four of the most pressing are:

1. Interrupted Careers

Academic careers depend on continuity — building long-term projects, supervising students, publishing steadily, and securing grants. Displacement severs that chain. Labs are left behind, collaborations are cut short, and years of research may be lost overnight. For women, who already face systemic barriers to advancement, these interruptions can be devastating.

2. Visa and Immigration Uncertainty

A displaced scholar’s ability to continue her work often depends on navigating complex, lengthy, and stressful visa and immigration processes. For women who may also be responsible for children or other dependents, this uncertainty adds another layer of difficulty.

3. Isolation

Moving into a new academic environment without networks is isolating. Women scholars may find it even harder to access male-dominated networks of influence in science, making integration and recognition more challenging.

4. Gendered Barriers Amplified

Exile compounds gender inequities. Women displaced from countries with restrictive gender norms often face stereotypes in host institutions as well. At the same time, they may lack childcare support, mentoring, or policies tailored to their circumstances.

Behind each of these categories are human stories: an Afghan astrophysicist banned from teaching because of her gender; an Iranian scientist forced into exile for her activism; Ukrainian researchers trying to balance caring for their children while keeping their research alive abroad.

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Why It Matters for Astronomy and STEM

Why should the scientific community, and especially astronomers, care? Because displacement is not only a humanitarian issue, but also a scientific one.

Every displaced woman scholar represents years of training, expertise, and creativity that science risks losing. Astronomy, like all sciences, thrives on diversity of thought and global collaboration. Yet when women are forced into silence or leave academia because of exile, our field becomes narrower, poorer, and less representative of humanity.

Astronomy in particular offers a symbolic reminder: while we study distant galaxies and exoplanets, we cannot ignore the struggles of those whose scientific journeys on Earth are disrupted. Science is a universal human pursuit, but access to it is not yet universal.

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Pathways Forward

There are already organizations working to support displaced scholars. The Scholars at Risk (SAR) network and the Institute of International Education’s Scholar Rescue Fund (IIE-SRF) have provided placements, fellowships, and funding to thousands of at-risk academics worldwide. SAR arranged at least 164 positions in the 2023–24 period [1]. The IIIE-SRF reports that it supported 234 scholars in 2024 (and documents its cumulative totals since 2002 of over 1,100 fellows) [2].

For women, targeted support is critical. This includes:

• Institutional commitments: Universities can develop fellowships specifically designed for displaced women scientists.
  
  

• Mentorship and networks: Connecting displaced women to mentors and peers can reduce isolation.
  
  

• Practical support: Childcare, relocation assistance, and mental health resources are often as important as research funding.
  
  

• Recognition: Host institutions and professional societies should actively highlight and celebrate the contributions of displaced women scientists.
  
  

Astronomy departments and associations, including the International Astronomical Union (IAU), the American Astronomical Society (AAS) community, can play a role by opening opportunities, finding host institutes, inviting displaced women to conferences, and advocating for inclusive funding policies.

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Photo Courtesy of Encieh Erfani, Ph.D.

Conclusion

The journeys of displaced women scholars are often invisible. Yet they are journeys of resilience as well as struggle. Supporting these women is not only a moral imperative; it is also essential for the vitality of science itself.

If we allow displacement to silence women scholars, we risk losing knowledge, perspectives, and discoveries that could shape the future of astronomy and beyond. If we act to support them, we affirm that science is truly a global and inclusive endeavor.

The sky reminds us daily that boundaries are human-made. Science, too, should transcend borders,  ensuring that no voice, especially that of a displaced woman, is left unheard.

References

1. Scholars-at-Risk-Annual-Report-2024, https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/Scholars-at-Risk-Annual-Report-2024-1.pdf?utm_source=chatgpt.com
2. https://www.scholarrescuefund.org/about-us/by-the-numbers/?utm_source=chatgpt.com

About our Guest Blogger:

Encieh Erfani is originally from Tabriz, Iran. She earned her Bachelor's degree in Physics from Tabriz University, followed by a Master's degree in Physics with a focus on Gravitation from Azarbaijan Shahid Madani University.

In 2007 she was awarded a Postgraduate Diploma Scholarship in High Energy Physics from the International Centre of Theoretical Physics (ICTP) in Trieste, Italy. She completed her dissertation, "The Standard Model Higgs Boson as the Inflaton?" under the guidance of Paolo Creminelli in August 2008.

Erfani pursued a PhD in the Physics Department of Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn in Germany, where she successfully defended her thesis, "Inflation and Dark Matter Primordial Black Holes" under the supervision of Manuel Drees in August 2012.

After completing her PhD, she moved back to Iran and worked as a Post-Doctoral fellow at the School of Physics in the Institute for Research in Fundamental Sciences (IPM) in Tehran, and a visiting researcher at ICTP-SAIFR in Brazil. 

She returned to Iran in 2015 and joined the Physics Department at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Basic Science (IASBS) as an Assistant Professor. However, Erfani resigned on 23 September 2022 in support of the "Woman, Life, Freedom" protests, which led to her exile. Currently, she is a researcher at Mainz University in Germany.

Learn more about her work at her LinkedIn profile or website.

Explore Your Career Options

In honor of "Explore Your Career Options Week" (April 6-12, 2025) and in support of our Career Profile series, below we highlight some folks who started out in Astronomy but have since moved on to other career fields. Many of them are willing to answer your questions. Take a look!

• Monica Kress: From Physics Faculty to Director of Undergraduate Advising

• Isabel Hawkins: Astronomer to Museum Project Director

• Joseph Pesce: Astronomer to Consultant

• Katie Peek: Astronomer to Infographics Maker

• Liliana Keats: Astronomer to Anthropometry Engineer

Find more Career Profiles here. Would you like to be profiled? Let us know!

Researcher Parents Pay EXTRA When Attending Conferences

"...as academics with caring responsibilities for young families, we face inequitable hurdles to fully attend and participate in activities that require us to spend time away from home."

In an opinion piece for Nature, Laura Carter, Laura Wolz and Laura Pallett, all research scientists in the United Kingdom, share experiences and advice for caregiving research scientists. In particular, they lament that while funding agencies recognize that "costs for dependants should not be parents’ financial liability", they still need to rely on the employing research organization to dictate what exactly can be claimed as an expense. They argue that, instead, carers need organizations to update and align internal financial reimbursement policies.

Image Credit: https://earlylearningnation.com

To do this, science policy must change to deliver initiatives that genuinely support those in need and that do not further burden an already overworked community. Opportunities need to be 

• flexible
• adaptable
• comprehensive and 
• transparent.

Read more at

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-01571-x

In this country, the National Academies has published multiple documents that describe policies and best practices for supporting family caregivers working in science, engineering, and medicine. You can find them here.

As a reminder, our professional societies provide grants to support caregiving activities. For example, the AAS' Division for Planetary Science offers a Dependent Care Grant, as does the American Geophysical Union (AGU) for specific AGU meetings.

See also:

• Hybrid scientific conferences: An ongoing experiment
• Study Shows Few Male Scientists are Involved Dads
• AAS DPS Professional Development Committee
• AAS DPS Subcommittee on Professional Culture and Climate

As the World Turns… An interview with the keeper of Earth’s rotation data

By Sethanne Howard

IERS - https://ggos.org/item/iers/ 

Meri Sue Carter is a Research Astronomer at the US Naval Observatory (USNO) in Flagstaff, Arizona. She was the Director of the World Data Center for the Rotation of the Earth, which coordinated data for the International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems (IERS) Service.  

NB: The World Data Centres (WDC) were reformed and a new ICSU World Data System (WDS) was established in 2009. Although there are no longer individual Directors of the WDC, Meri Sue and the Earth Orientation Department at USNO still maintain historical Earth Orientation data and serve that data to users all over the world. 

Astronomers not only observe planetary, celestial, and galactic objects, but they also monitor Earth’s rotation throughout time. Meri Sue Carter’s background and career trajectory made her well-poised to take on the task of keeping tabs on Earth’s rotation. 

Early Life
Meri Sue Carter grew up in a household oriented around science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). Both parents were life-long learners - her mother was in school and her father a geodesist - and scientists from around the world joined the family at the dinner table. All eagerly discussed their work with Meri Sue, so going to college was a given, and a career in astronomy a valid goal. 

Growing up with a set of sisters, the family did not see girls’ jobs and boys’ jobs, they saw ‘jobs’ doable by anyone. For example, her father built the lunar laser ranging system in Hawai’i, so there were often nights when Meri Sue watched and learned about the night sky while her father collected data to measure movement of the Earth's tectonic plates, the length of day, and the Earth's polar motion (LURE). Shooting a laser was just something everyone did, she thought, and as a young child, Meri Sue played with laser pointers.

At the University of Maryland, Meri Sue earned a bachelor’s degree then applied for jobs in the DC area. It was while attending a public tour at the US Naval Observatory (USNO) to see Halley’s Comet in 1986 when she learned about some job openings there and took a one-year temporary position. During her time, she was told the USNO would pay for graduate school if she spent five years there, and after seven years at USNO, she attended university part time so that she could spend time with her growing family. Thirteen years later, she finished her Master’s degree, earning and maintaining computer certification, while also trained to use the Very Long Baseline Interferometer (VLBI) and global positioning system (GPS) data to produce images of radio sources. In 1996, Meri Sue moved to the USNO in Flagstaff to become the Director of the World Data Center A for the Rotation of the Earth.

Meri Sue Carter

Position

Meri Sue is responsible for coordinating data for the International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems (IERS) Service, the body responsible for maintaining global time and reference frame standards, notably through its Earth Orientation Parameter and International Celestial Reference System groups. The sub-bureau for Rapid Service and Predictions of Earth Orientation Parameters of the IERS, located at the USNO, monitors the Earth's rotation (hence Meri Sue). Part of its mission involves determining a time scale based on the current rate of the rotation of the Earth. Other services of IERS are done at the Paris Observatory. 

A typical day for Meri Sue at the USNO begins at 8 AM local time, starting with checking email to see if anything needs quick attention, e.g., something sent from DC several hours earlier. There are usually one or two meetings every day that might include a scientific talk. 

The daily report (i.e., “bulletin”) on the Earth’s rotation is due at 10 AM every day.  Data for the report originate from the world-wide network of dedicated telescopes that observe the current rotation of the Earth. The observations are sent to USNO where Meri Sue uses the observations to produce the daily and weekly products which are then distributed around the world.  Although automatic to produce, the products need cross-checking before distributing. Meri Sue reports, “I attend meetings at the Flagstaff station to make sure we will not be impacted by issues such as power outages, or network changes.”

The data (on time and rotation) included in the daily and weekly products are critical for navigation, certainly for the Navy (and all branches of the military) but also for anybody interested in navigation, pointing (as in pointing a space telescope), real-time orbit determination (as in planetary missions), ephemerides (to establish the orbit for a planetary mission), and leap second determinations. The most accurate predictions are needed for real time Earth satellite orbit determination and VLBI analysis. These predictions define the IERS Reference Meridian, the International Terrestrial Reference System, and subsequent International Terrestrial Reference Frames. Related coordinate systems are used by satellite navigation systems like GPS and Galileo.

Meri Sue also produces the observing schedules for the world wide network of IERS telescopes. She produces and distributes those schedules to the network of telescopes and then checks daily to see the status of each station. She looks for problems that might impact the data. Examples include: Did they miss the scheduled observation? What was the issue? Is it resolved for tomorrow? Do new schedules need to be made to remove the issue or include it in a better way? She works with USNO staff members in DC on software upgrades or fixes to USNO code or fixes to the data files or distribution methods. 

Like many astronomers she engages in public outreach.  She, like the rest of us, gives public lectures, runs visitor nights at telescopes, answers questions from the general public, gives tours, and engages in public events such as Science in the Park. 

Meri Sue reports that she is very satisfied with her job. Even with the daily and weekly deadlines, she has the freedom to schedule much of her time. The job is always changing, and true to her parents’ lifestyle and her own upbringing, she embraces the need to be a life-long learner willing to adapt to new technology, including that which enables her to work from home or other locations. All of this makes the job enjoyable, she reports. Importantly, there is time to write scientific papers or use the USNO telescopes for projects. 

Her work-life balance is stable, though she admits that “twenty years ago, the USNO was not particularly family friendly”. Without cell phones and a robust Internet, child care could interfere with career advancement.  Today, with modern technology, USNO is more family friendly.  Meri Sue can often work at home or other places.

Genealogy

Meri Sue’s father introduced her to the night sky and fostered her love of astronomy. As a geodesist, he worked on projects around the world and when they both questioned an article about the Chandler Wobble in Eos, they began writing a response together. The Chandler wobble, or Chandler variation of latitude, is a small deviation in the Earth's axis of rotation relative to the solid Earth, which was discovered by and named after American astronomer Seth Carlo Chandler in 1891. The Carters’ response grew longer and eventually turned into a book, Latitude, a history of the breakthrough discovery of the explanation for the Chandler Wobble. It makes a nice companion to Longitude by Daval Sobel. During her background research on the Chandler Wobble, Meri Sue compiled information about Simon Newcomb (1835 - 1909), an astronomer at USNO who established the US as a major player in world astronomy. Being in DC at the time she had access to the Library of Congress and the USNO Library. I expect there is another book in the making.  

There is a third generation of scientists in the family. One of her sons showed early aptitude for mechanical engineering, and as a high school intern at USNO, he conducted studies of astronomical seeing in the Flagstaff area to determine the best site for a new telescope - after making the mount for the seeing instrument! A very creative young mind, indeed. USNO will build its newest telescope (TBD) at the site he chose. Her daughter has applied to vet school - not astronomy but still science.  

So there are three generations of the Carter family working in astronomy or related subjects. 

Advice

“Be flexible and have a good support system. My family supports me and knows that sometimes I really do need to work “right now” and so maybe they have to wait an hour longer than they want to head out for a family hike. But they also know that there are days that we are completely free. My parents have always supported me by coming to my home every year to cook Thanksgiving dinner…. I always work on Thanksgiving and it was very hard to manage my kids and the food and the workload on that day. So, it became a tradition that my parents come to my home and take care of that day. I would work Thanksgiving and my co-worker (with no kids) would always work Christmas. It really does take a village!”

Final Thoughts

Meri Sue’s academic and career paths are not typical, and that’s okay. “Completing a degree is not the end of the path”, she said. In your career, “you need to stay up to date, so the study skills and time management skills from college have helped with that.”

Women of Arecibo: Dr. Nipuni Palliyaguru

Written by Nipuni Palliyaguru

I am a radio astronomer and postdoctoral researcher at Texas Tech University and a former postdoctoral researcher

at the Arecibo Observatory. This is a personal account of my experiences. The views expressed in this article are my 

own and do not reflect those of an organization.

The first time I learned to use a radio telescope was with Arecibo. It was in January 2011, when one 

of my graduate school supervisors, Dr. Dan Stinebring took me and three undergraduate students to

Puerto Rico to observe the scintillation of apulsar.  Throughout the night, I watched the pulses of

light from the pulsar appear in real-time on an oscilloscope. Since that first night and throughout my 

graduate school career, I visited Arecibo many times for various observation trips and scientific 

meetings. From summer school for students and frequent visits from scientists from across the 

globe, the observatory maintained a rich and vibrant academic culture. 

I always wanted to work at an observatory, so, I was 

thrilled when I was offered position as a postdoctoral 

scientist at Arecibo in the fall of 2017. Secretly, I 

really wanted  to be like Ellie Harroway in the movie 

“Contact” (who’s real-life protagonist, Jill Tarter, I later had the privilege of meeting at Arecibo). Living and 

working in a predominantly Spanish speaking 

community was a new experience after years of 

working in the mainland US. I experienced a way of 

doing  science in a way that was intertwined with 

culture. There was an overall familial atmosphere within the observatory. Remarkably, over seventy percent 

of the scientific staff was female, and a large majority were women of  color, just like me. Outside, Arecibo

had instilled a sense of pride in the people of Puerto 

Rico. However, it didn’t take too long for me to 

realize that things  had drastically changed from the thriving environment I had witnessed during graduate school trips. Hurricane Maria had just hit, leaving the island with no power and water. The observatory 

was also affected by some damages to the dish, reducing its efficiency significantly. The future of Arecibo was uncertain. The staff was tired of dealing with the disheartening recommendations of divesting the telescope and anxiously awaited the impending management change. Amidst this chaos, following the hurricane, the Arecibo staff worked tirelessly to get the telescope up and running. 

Leading from the middle

In the late spring of 2018, Arecibo underwent a drastic change in management that particularly 

affected the  junior scientists at the observatory. Many of the senior staff left, crippling daily 

operations and leaving the postdocs to take on many extra observatory-level responsibilities. For 

a few months, Arecibo  was defunct academically. There were no workshops, no summer schools, 

and interaction with the rest of the world was minimal. We rarely had scientists visit for observations 

or colloquia. It was hard to perform daily duties like analyzing data and writing papers because of

the uncertainty looming over us. 

In February 2019, I, along with several other postdocs, organized an “Arecibo Futures” meeting 

to bring the management, scientists, engineers, and the local community together to talk about 

a science blueprint for the observatory spanning the next decade. The Astronomy and Astrophysics

Decadal Survey, which funding agencies use to identify transformative science and set funding 

priorities for theupcoming decade, was also happening at this time. For the survey, we submitted 

several white papers highlighting the importance of Arecibo and the role of ground-based facilities 

in terms of training the next generation of astronomers, with the hope of increasing the funding 

profile of the observatory and attracting new funders.

We also identified the need to attract new users for 

the observatory and restarted the joint Arecibo-

Green Bank single dish summer schools for 

students. About 15 undergraduate students 

attended the school to learn about how to observe 

with Arecibo. Throughout this time there were

 moments of not being taken seriously and 

undermining efforts which women of color, I am 

sure, are quite accustomed to. However, I was 

fortunate to get the support of my Ph.D. supervisor, 

Dr. Maura McLaughlin, and other well-wishers for 

my research and outreach activities and other 

ventures.

 

 

 

 

Students of Puerto Rico

 

During this time, I was thinking of ways to involve undergraduate students on the island in active 

research at the observatory since I was already working closely with the University of Puerto Rico 

(UPR) Mayaguez campus on various projects. Undergraduate students from institutions on the 

island often visited the observatory for colloquia and special seminars and there was a lot of 

interestto get actively involved, but there wasn’t a direct throughline to getting involved in 

research at Arecibo. 

In May 2019, the Arecibo receiver engineer Felix

Fernandez and I visited the UPR Mayaguez campus to

talk to students about potential research projects. 

Having laid the groundwork for potential 

undergraduate research, I worked closely with 

student groups to organize a data reduction and

science communication workshop at UPR. At 

the workshop, students learned to process Arecibo

 pulsar data. The goal of the science communications workshop was to build an island-wide network of 

trained ambassadors educating various audiences 

about astrophysical concepts.

It was heartening to see the efforts by students to 

make these workshops a success and the plans they 

made for future involvement.

 

 

 

 

Final thoughts 

At the end of summer in 2019, I left Puerto Rico for a position in the mainland U.S. because I 

wanted to focus more on my research. However, for Arecibo, the funding challenges remained. 

It was devastating to watch the collapse almost two years later. Like many others in the 

astronomy community, I mourned the loss with extreme sadness. Nonetheless, something that 

continued to amaze me is the commitment and resilience of the staff throughout those 

challenging times.

 

As for me personally, I carry the burden of being a woman of color in academia. Arecibo was 

one of the first places that challenged me to step out of my academic research comfort zone 

and get a taste of what doing research in a resource-poor environment is like. In other words, 

I owe my recent growth as a professional to Arecibo.  Even though there were many challenges, 

I am glad that at Arecibo, I found a group of supportive colleagues and the opportunity to grow

as a scientist and a community advocate.

I strongly believe that scientific research should be accessible to all, especially to those who 

have been traditionally underrepresented in the sciences. Arecibo was a symbol of pride for 

Puerto Ricans and was a source of inspiration for students. With proper resources and a vision, 

it could have pioneered untapped scientific talent in Puerto Rico. Considering Arecibo’s role in 

education and outreach, providing opportunities for minority scientists, and cultural exposures 

for the next generation of scientists in the mainland U.S and Puerto Rico, the loss of the 

telescope is unquantifiable. Therefore, it is crucial that rebuilding plans are successful. I hope 

that Arecibo will soon be on its feet again to continue its invaluable service to both astronomers 

and the citizens of Puerto Rico.

-------------------------------------

Bio

Dr. Nipuni Palliyaguru is a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Physics and Astronomy 

at Texas Tech University. Before joining Texas Tech, she worked as a postdoctoral researcher at 

the Arecibo Observatory and Texas Tech University.  She received her Ph.D. from West Virginia 

University where she was supervised by Prof. Maura McLaughlin. Dr. Palliyaguru’s research 

focuses on transient events in the radio sky such as supernovae, pulsars, and Fast Radio Bursts.