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Danielle Alvarez

Danielle Alvarez
Assistant Contracts Specialist

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George Angeli

George Angeli
System Engineering Group Leader

George Angeli, head of systems engineering for the TMT project, has been involved in the design of Extremely Large Telescopes since 2001. Before joining the TMT project he worked on the Giant Segmented Mirror Telescope (GSMT) project at NOAO/AURA. Earlier in his career, he built various optical and electronics instruments, ranging from lasers and optical interferometers to analytical spectrometers, high performance analog electronics, and automated assembly and test equipment. George has a PhD in electrical engineering and optical science from the University of Arizona and is the author of numerous technical papers in peer-reviewed journals and conference proceedings.

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Curtis Baffes
Optomechanical Engineer

Curt Baffes has a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. An employee of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, he has 5 years of experience in optomechanical design, analysis, and hardware implementation. Curt has developed mechanical systems for space-, Earth-, and Mars-based optical instruments.

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Max Berry

Max Berry
Assistant Systems Administrator-IMSS

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Corinne Boyer

Corinne Boyer
Senior Adaptive Optics Systems Engineer

Corinne Boyer obtained her engineering degree in servo control and her master's degree in instrumentation and control system from the Ecole Nationale Superieure d’Ingenieurs de Caen, France, in 1986. Corinne has 20 years of experience in managing, designing, developing, and testing adaptive optics control systems. In 1998, she moved to the United States to join the Gemini Observatory in Hilo, where she participated in the integration, testing, and commissioning of the Gemini telescopes. Since 2005, Corinne has been working for the TMT and is now the AO systems engineer.

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David Crampton

David Crampton
Instruments Group Leader

David Crampton has a PhD in astrophysics from the University of Toronto. David has been a user of forefront optical telescopes since 1965 and has been involved in the planning of such facilities since 1974 (CFHT). As PI of several instruments (primarily for CFHT and Gemini) David has overseen the development of astronomical instrumentation for over 30 years, and led the instrumentation team at Victoria for 20 years. David has also established a strong reputation in astrophysical research, publishing more than 400 articles.

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Sandra Dawson
Task Leader for TMT Site Master Planning

Sandra has a bachelor of arts degree in political science and a master's in international studies from Claremont Graduate University. Sandra worked at JPL for 20 years on some of JPLs largest projects, and received numerous group and individual awards. Sandra has expertise in environmental policy and legal compliance for science projects and in the communication of technical and legal risks. She is the environmental policy and communication lead at TMT.

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Pratheep Eamranond

Pratheep Eamranond
Senior Contracts Specialist

Pratheep has a bachelor's degree in liberal arts from Clark University, a JD from the Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago-Kent College of Law, and is pursuing an MBA from Claremont Graduate University's Peter F. Drucker and Masatoshi Ito School of Business. Pratheep has 8 years of experience in contract negotiation and management, is a member of the California Bar Association, and has passed the Illinois State Bar.

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Brent Ellerbroek

Brent Ellerbroek
Adaptive Optics Group Leader

Brent Ellerbroek has a bachelor of science in mathematics from the University of California at Los Angeles, and received his PhD in mathematics from the California Institute of Technology. He has over 25 years of experience in modeling, designing, and testing adaptive optical systems for atmospheric turbulence compensation. Brent has expertise in the application of control theory and computational mathematics to adaptive optics, adaptive optics component technologies, adaptive optics modeling and systems engineering, and project/contract management. He is a Fellow and a journal editor for the Optical Society of America and a frequent chair of conferences on adaptive optics.

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Luc Gilles

Luc Gilles
Adaptive Optics Analyst

Luc Gilles has a PhD in physics from Imperial College, London, UK. Luc has 14 years experience in the analysis, modeling, and simulation of optical components and systems, including 7 years experience in astronomical adaptive optics. Luc has authored more than 20 refereed journal papers on a wide range of problems in quantum and nonlinear optics, photonics, imaging, and adaptive optics.

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Paul Gillett

Paul Gillett
Site Selection Project Manager

Paul Gillett obtained bachelor’s and master’s degrees in civil engineering and began his career working on the design and construction of offshore oil installations. Later, after obtaining his PhD, he did early design work on the Next Generation Telescope project, which eventually led to the Gemini Project. For several years in the interim, he worked for architectural-engineering companies and then returned to the astronomy field to work on the Gemini telescopes. Paul designed the telescope mount and pier, and was heavily involved in the design of the summit facilities. He then was the site manager for construction of the Gemini South facilities, and was later the project manager for the Gemini southern headquarters building. Gillett now manages the TMT site-testing effort and has become responsible for the TMT facilities, which include buildings, general equipment, and other site infrastructure.

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David Goodman

David Goodman
Business Manager

David Goodman has over 30 years of business experience in global engineering and manufacturing organizations. He has effectively shaped and led teams responsible for finance, budgeting, accounting, contracts, pricing, estimating, project controls, human resources, supplier management, procurement, and property management. David has a degree in economics from the University of Missouri, Columbia.

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Peter Gray

Peter Gray
Assistant Project Manager

Peter Gray has a bachelor of science degree in physics and a bachelor of engineering degree in mechanical engineering from the University of Sydney. He has over 26 years of experience of engineering design and operations support for many of the world's major observatories and large telescope projects. His early career at the Anglo-Australian Observatory was in the design and construction of astronomical instrumentation, particularly multi-object fiber spectrographs, where he helped pioneer this technology. Gray moved to the University of Arizona where he was involved in many projects at the Mirror Lab, MMT, and LBT telescopes. He later led the assembly and integration phase for ESO's four VLT telescopes at Paranal Observatory in Chile, where, as head of engineering, he established engineering operations support. He has worked on system engineering for the ALMA project, and most recently served as Associate Director of Engineering at the Gemini Observatory, where he successfully led the engineering team during the transition from commissioning to science operations.

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Florence Kaufman

Florence Kaufman
Controller

Florence Kaufman has a bachelor's degree in accounting and an MBA from California State University at Los Angeles. She qualified as a CPA in 1970 and has experience in private, public, and governmental accounting. She worked as a financial analyst for the LIGO project for 9 years.

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Douglas MacMynowski
Senior Research Fellow in Control/Dynamical Systems

Douglas MacMynowski is a senior research fellow in the Department of Control and Dynamical Systems at the California Institute of Technology. MacMynowski received his bachelor of applied science degree from the University of Toronto in 1987, and SM and PhD in aeronautics and astronautics from MIT in 1990 and 1992. Prior to joining Caltech in 2000, he led the active control research and development program at United Technologies Research Center. His expertise includes controls, structural dynamics, acoustics, and fluid dynamics, and he is an author or co-author on five patents and over 60 papers.

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Jerry Nelson

Jerry Nelson
Project Scientist

Jerry Nelson has a bachelor of science in physics from Caltech, and a PhD in elementary particle physics from the University of California in Berkeley. He is the appointed Project Scientist of TMT and currently a professor of astronomy and astrophysics in the University of California in Santa Cruz. He has earned numerous honors for his work on the Keck Telescope, and has experience in experimental high energy physics, observational astronomy, astronomical instrumentation, and telescope design. He has extensive knowledge of optics, optical support systems, kinematic design, and structural engineering. Jerry has received various awards and is a member of the National Academy of Sciences. He has authored numerous publications in physics, astronomy, instrumentation, and telescope design.

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Holly Novack

Holly Novack
Office Administrator

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Jeff Oram
Cost Estimator

Jeff Oram has bachelor's and master's degrees in mathematics from Eastern Washington University and an MBA degree in finance from Loyola Marymount University. Jeff has 10 years of experience in financial and operations cost modeling, and 5 years of experience as a mathematics instructor. Jeff has expertise in developing parametric cost models, project proposal pricing, and database development.

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Ben Platt
Senior Optical Engineer

Ben Platt has a master's degree in physics from Louisiana State University and a PhD in optical sciences from the University of Arizona. He has over 30 years of experience in the field of optical engineering, fabrication, and research. He has experience in infrared technology, lithography, high energy lasers, large telescopes, interferometry, optical fabrication and testing, airborne and space optics, and ophthalmic instruments for vision correction, and has authored many papers and invention reports in these areas. He holds a patent for an ophthalmic UV projection system used in a vision correction instrument. His skills include optical engineering, fabrication, testing, analysis, documentation, and contract management. He is a member of the SPIE. While working at JPL, Platt received a NASA award for the development of a critical optical component for a space-based interferometer.

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Lennon Rodgers
Mechanical Engineer

Lennon Rodgers has a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a master's degree in mechanical engineering from MIT. He has worked on the Keck Interferometer and the Space Interferometry Mission.

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Gary Sanders

Gary Sanders
Project Manager

Gary Sanders spent 25 years performing high-energy physics experiments at laboratories in the United States and Europe. He earned an AB degree in physics from Columbia University and a PhD in high-energy physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He has been a faculty member in physics at Princeton University and a scientist at Los Alamos National Laboratory. In 1994, Gary came to Caltech to serve as the Project Manager and Deputy Director for the Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory (LIGO) project. Gary joined TMT as its Project Manager in 2004. He is the author or a co-author of more than 175 peer-reviewed publications and he has been elected a Fellow of the American Physical Society.

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Matthias Schoeck

Matthias Schoeck
Site Testing Scientist/Manager

Matthias Schoeck started his studies in physics at the University in Karlsruhe, Germany and received his PhD in astrophysics from the University of Wyoming in 1998. He has been working on site testing issues for TMT, and previously for CELT/GSMT, since 2001. His previous experience, gained during postdoctoral positions in Lyon, France and Irvine, California, is in adaptive optics and methods of atmospheric turbulence analysis. Matthias currently leads the TMT Site Testing Group.

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David Silva

David Silva
Observatory Scientist

David Silva has a bachelor of science degree in astronomy and physics from the University of Arizona and a PhD from the University of Michigan. His scientific interests are extragalactic stellar populations, early-type galaxies, stars above the TRGB, and digital stellar libraries. He has more than 20 years of experience in observatory operations with a particular emphasis on user support, end-to-end data management systems, queue observing, and data processing and quality control. Prior to joining the TMT project team, he was a member of the NOAO science staff for 6 years and the ESO science staff for 9 years. He is currently an AURA Senior Scientist, seconded to the TMT Project Office.

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Mark Sirota

Mark Sirota
Telescope Controls Group Leader

Mark Sirota has bachelor's and master's degrees in electrical engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and California State University at Fullerton, respectively. Prior to joining TMT, Mark spent nearly 15 years at the W.M. Keck Observatory as part of the Senior Management Team and was the Project Manager for the Magdalena Ridge Observatory Interferometer. Mark’s background is in dynamics and control and he has authored a number of papers on the subject; in addition, Mark has experience in technical and project management. Mark is responsible for TMT's telescope control systems, including precision control of the 492 primary mirror segments.

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Warren Skidmore

Warren Skidmore
Site Testing Scientist

Warren Skidmore has a bachelor of science degree (honors) in physics and astrophysics from Leicester University, master of science degree in astrophysics from QMWC, University of London, and a PhD in astrophysics from Keele University. He has published many research articles within the field of cataclysmic variables, is an experienced and active observational astronomer, and often acts as a referee for astronomical journals. Warren has worked extensively within the TMT site testing group and has developed new methods for assessing the quality of sites for astronomical observations. He continues to work within the TMT systems engineering group as an experimental scientist, assisting the design and development of TMT by investigating the behavior of the telescope subsystems.

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Larry Stepp

Larry Stepp
Telescope Department Head

Larry Stepp has a bachelor's degree in interdisciplinary science and a master's degree in engineering mechanics from the University of Nebraska - Lincoln. He has more than 20 years of experience in the mechanical design, fabrication, and testing of large optics, including management responsibility for the WIYN primary mirror assembly and the Gemini Optics group. Larry led the AURA New Initiatives Office team that developed the concept for the Giant Segmented Mirror Telescope (GSMT), one of the precursors to TMT. He has been active in the SPIE symposiums on telescopes and instruments for astronomy and has chaired several conferences.

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Kei Szeto

Kei Szeto
Telescope Structures Group Leader

Kei Szeto has a bachelor of engineering degree in mechanical engineering from McGill University and a master's degree in ocean engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Kei has over 20 years of mechanical engineering design experience, including more than 10 years of direct experience in the development of astronomical instruments. Kei has led teams of astronomers, engineers, and technicians in various instrumentation projects. Kei's expertise is in optomechanical design, structural and dynamic analyses, and scientific project management by providing technical and organizational leadership to the design team. Kei is a Professional Engineer in the province of British Columbia, Canada.

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Tony Travouillon

Tony Travouillon
Site Testing Scientist

Tony Travouillon has a doctorate in astronomy from the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia. After spending a few years site testing the Antarctic continent with Australian and European teams, Tony joined TMT to study the candidate sites for this project. He is specialized in astroclimatology, or developing and applying instrumentation to measure the different atmospheric parameters that affect the performance of an observatory.

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Thang Trinh

Thang Trinh
Lead Telescope Controls SW Engineer

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Konstantinos Vogiatzis

Konstantinos Vogiatzis
Senior Aero-thermal Engineer

Konstantinos Vogiatzis has a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from the National Technical University of Athens, Greece, a PhD in engineering science from Louisiana State University at Baton Rouge with minors in astrophysics and oceanography, and has done postdoctoral studies in computational fluid dynamics at the University of Kentucky in Lexington. Konstantinos has more than 14 years of experience in performing flow simulations of aerospace and mechanical systems configurations. He has expertise in the modeling and analysis of telescope performance, computational fluid dynamics simulations of wind flow above topography, inside enclosures, around telescopes, and inside combustion chambers of turbines engines and power plants. Konstantinos is a member of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics and a registered professional mechanical engineer with the Technical Chambers of Greece.

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Lianqi Wang

Lianqi Wang
Asst Adaptive Optics Systems Analyst

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Eric Williams

Eric Williams
Telescope Optics Group Leader

Eric Williams has a bachelor's degree in engineering (mechanical) from San Francisco State University. Eric has over 20 years of mechanical design and analysis experience, much gained in the aerospace industry, where he contributed to the development of composite spacecraft structures, submarine propulsion systems, and solid rocket development programs prior to specializing in optomechanics in recent years. Eric has extensive experience designing and optimizing structural components and systems, including flexure-based support systems, kinematic mounts, and precision mechanisms.

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Magnolia Ycasas

Magnolia Ycasas
Human Resources Specialist

Magnolia Ycasas has a bachelor of arts degree in business management with a major in human resources administration from De La Salle University, Manila, Philippines. Magnolia has 12 years of experience in performing skilled, confidential functions utilizing her expertise in human resources, in areas such as employment, benefits administration, payroll, staff development/training, employee relations, compensation, employee services, employer-sponsored visa services, and leave and disability administration. She is also involved in creating programs critical to TMT's workplace environment consistent with the project's organizational goals.

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Joelle Zavzavadjian

Joelle Zavzavadjian
Senior Financial Analyst

Joelle Zavzavadjian has a bachelor's degree in biology from East Central University, a master’s degree in physiology from the University of Oklahoma, and an MBA with a concentration in finance from the University of Redlands. Joelle has 7 years of experience in performing data management, organization, and analysis. She is responsible for the analysis of past and present financial operations to determine trends, generate budget forecasts, and optimize resources. She also establishes guidelines and procedures to ensure adequacy, quality, and reliability of financial information.

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The TMT project is a collaboration of Caltech, University of California (UC) and the Association of Canadian Universities for Research in Astronomy (ACURA). © Thirty Meter Telescope
 

 

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