I am an astrophysicist and SNSF Ambizione Group Leader at the Department of Astronomy of the University of Geneva. The research focus of my group is planets orbiting binary stars , which we address both from an observational and theoretical standpoint. We use CHEOPS to follow-up TESS planet candidates orbiting one of the two stars in a binary (S-type planets), with the goal of identifying which star the planet really orbits and thus correctly infer the planetary radius. We also use NIRPS to follow-up and characterise S-type planets hosted by M-dwarfs. On the theoretical side, we are adapting a standard model of planet formation (for single stars) to binary stars. We have included the effect of disc truncation and gravitational perturbations stemming from the secondary star into the Bern Model, and we are starting to compute the first planet populations synthesis for binary stars.

Group Members:
  • Arianna Nigioni (PhD student, CHEOPS, planet formation simulations).
  • Lina Messamah (PhD student, NIRPS).

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    I am originally from Uruguay. There I completed my undergraduate studies in Physics, option Astronomy, at the Universidad de la Republica. In 2012 I moved to Switzerland to do my PhD at the University of Bern, on the field of Planet Formation Theory. Before working at the Geneva Observatory, I was a postdoctoral fellow at ISSI, and a postdoc at the University of Zurich.