Joseph Ribaudo, an associate professor of physics at Utica College and 2001 Falconer Central School graduate, has received a $121,942 grant from the National Science Foundation.

Ribaudo applied for the grant with the intention of researching where galaxies begin and end. The research will be conducted with students and will compare and contrast data from different observatories to determine the beginning and end points of distant galaxies. The grant will be provided over a three-year period.

Ribaudo and another student began researching data in the spring semester and will continue work throughout the three years of the grant. Ribaudo is hopeful he will be able to add more students as research continues; he said the majority of the early work will include “writing code” for programs to analyze data he is researching.

“My student and I began to analyze data sets,” Ribaudo said of the recent work.

Ribaudo’s goal is to help astronomers understand galaxies better through studying how galaxies form and evolve throughout time. With combined data from the Arecibo Observatory and the Hubble Space Telescope, Ribaudo said the results will hopefully reveal the connection between gas surrounding galaxies and gas within a galaxy.

By observing light passing through the distant galaxies Ribaudo and cohorts will be able to analyze the data of different gases within those systems. Not only does Ribaudo hope to understand gases in other galaxies better, he hopes the research can be applied to the Milky Way system as well. Data that spans across 30,000 different galaxies will be compiled and analyzed through the grant program.

Ribaudo said data from the traditional optical-telescopes and data related to radio astronomy will be combined as a new way of studying gases in other galaxies.

Radio astronomy focuses on light that isn’t detectable by the human eye. Ribaudo said the combination of the different data would hopefully be like “viewing the universe in a different way.”

The award marks the first time in almost 15 years since Utica has received a grant from the National Science Foundation.

Students who partake in the grant program will be paid for their research efforts and any traveling that is required will be accommodated through the grant money.

Ribaudo, an astrophysicist, earned his doctorate at Notre Dame University and has been published in “Physics Today,” a popular science magazine. While attending Notre Dame, Ribaudo and a group of astrophysicists received national recognition for their publication of research involving “cool circumgalatic gas” in 2013.

Ribaudo said while attending Falconer Central School he found an interest in math and science and his former physics teacher Bill Kilmartin was a large influence on his career path.

“(Kilmartin) was a big reason why I got very excited about physics,” Ribaudo said.

Ribaudo said the fact that Utica, a relatively smaller university, received the NSF grant was a “big deal” because of the competitive nature of the application process. He had to write a “compelling” proposal within his application to receive the grant.

The grant is active until November 2020 and will allow students the opportunity to laboratory activities, research and the chance to showcase their undergraduate work at national conferences.

At the conferences, students who join the grant program will create poster presentations that will share updates on the current status of the research. Ribaudo said the conferences will give the students “professional experience.”