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Dr Becky Smethurst
@drbecky_
Astrophysicist researching how supermassive black holes affect galaxies (s/h). I get overly enthusiastic about space on YouTube: youtube.com/drbecky
Oxford, England
linktr.ee/drbecky
Joined March 2009
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  • Pinned
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    Dr Becky Smethurst
    @drbecky_
    Sep 1, 2022
    It’s publication day 🥳 my new book “A Brief History of Black Holes” is now out in the world! It covers many common misconceptions around black holes by using the history of our understanding. Here’s a sneak peek! Grab a copy (hardback, audio, ebook): hyperurl.co/DrBecky
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    Dr Becky Smethurst
    @drbecky_
    Jul 12, 2022
    I can't stop flipping back and forth between the Hubble and James Webb Space Telescope images of the Carina Nebula. In the Hubble image the dust is just this wall that looks solid, and JWST has revealed the structure in that dust that has remained hidden for so long.
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    Dr Becky Smethurst
    @drbecky_
    Dec 25, 2021
    An astrophysicist’s nervous live reaction to the launch of the James Webb Space Telescope from a kitchen cooking a Christmas turkey in Lancashire, England - we like the word NOMINAL! 🥳 #JWST #JamesWebbSpaceTelescope #UnfoldTheUniverse @NASAWebb @ESA_Webb
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    Dr Becky Smethurst
    @drbecky_
    Jun 30, 2023
    My favourite fact about the BIG gravitational wave news, is that it was only made possible because we finally know the precise position of Jupiter! 🤯 Thanks to @chrislintott for flagging this cool fact #pulsartimingarray #nanograv #GravitationalWaves @NASAJuno
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    Dr Becky Smethurst
    @drbecky_
    Mar 17, 2022
    CAN'T. STOP. WATCHING. Comparison of JWST resolution (70 mas, 0.00002°) compared to Spitzer (2as, 0.0005°) a space telescope that also viewed the universe in infrared light
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    gbrammer
    @gbrammer
    Mar 17, 2022
    #JWST is looking awesome
    GIF
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    Dr Becky Smethurst
    @drbecky_
    Mar 16, 2022
    On the NASA live stream, they just said that the resolution achieved with JWST was 0.0000194° (i.e. the smallest thing they can spot spans 0.0000194° of 360° round the sky). 28 TIMES BETTER THAN Spitzer (also an infrared space telescope) which had a resolution of 0.00056°
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    Dr Becky Smethurst
    @drbecky_
    May 12, 2022
    An astrophysicist’s live reaction to the reveal of the image of the supermassive black hole at the centre of our galaxy, the Milky Way 😍🥳😱@ehtelescope #EventHorizonTelescope
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    Dr Becky Smethurst
    @drbecky_
    Jun 29, 2023
    BIG NEWS IN PHYSICS! The first ever evidence for light year long gravitational waves that *might* be due to merging supermassive black holes. All possible thanks to pulsar timing arrays, explained in this video 👇 #GravitationalWaves #NANOGrav #pulsars
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    Dr Becky Smethurst
    @drbecky_
    Jul 11, 2022
    🤯🤯🤯 It’s like the Hubble Ultra Deep Field turned up to 11! The sheer number of galaxies in this image is astounding (image size is same as a grain of sand at arms length!) - PLUS LENSES! No doubt the most distant galaxy ever found is in there I bet 100+ new papers just here
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    Dr Becky Smethurst
    @drbecky_
    Mar 17, 2022
    Number 23 on trending on YouTube?!?! That’s never happened before! 🥳🥳🥳 plus I just passed 400,000 subscribers 🤯 Thanks all for being as excited about the James Webb Space Telescope as I am! @NASAWebb @ESA_Webb youtu.be/1nOX66G5q9E
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    Dr Becky Smethurst
    @drbecky_
    Jul 18, 2022
    For everyone like me who's excited for JWST to observe the 7 planet system TRAPPIST-1 - it did so yesterday morning for over 5 hours 👀 From the published JWST observing schedule here: stsci.edu/files/live/sit…
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    Dr Becky Smethurst
    @drbecky_
    Jan 14, 2022
    I am absolutely THRILLED that I have been awarded the @RoyalAstroSoc's Winton Award for research by a post-doctoral fellow in astronomy whose career has shown the most promising development
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    Royal Astronomical Society
    @RoyalAstroSoc
    Jan 14, 2022
    Replying to @RoyalAstroSoc
    The 2022 Winton Award for Astronomy is awarded to Dr Rebecca Smethurst (@drbecky_) of @OxfordPhysics for making major advances in the field of galaxy formation and evolution.
    Image of Dr Rebecca Smethurst with text reading "Winton Award for Astronomy 2022". RAS logo in top right corner.
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    Dr Becky Smethurst
    @drbecky_
    Sep 11, 2019
    I cannot stress how incredible this is. They detected the tiniest bit of starlight that came from the star and then passed through the planet’s atmosphere on its way to us; then managed to detect the tiny bit in the light that was absorbed by the water in that atmosphere🤯#k218b
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    Josh Lothringer
    @JDLothringer
    Sep 11, 2019
    So we found water vapor in the atmosphere of a 9 Earth-mass exoplanet in the habitable zone! After observing 8 transits of K2-18b with HST/WFC3, we (led by Björn Benneke) find a significant water feature: arxiv.org/abs/1909.04642
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    Dr Becky Smethurst
    @drbecky_
    Aug 22, 2022
    There's a pseudo-science article that's gone viral recently claiming that JWST images are showing the Big Bang "didn't happen". It’s all complete tosh. More on this in Thursday's Night Sky News video about what JWST data is actually showing and what it means 👍
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