Riley Owens

Riley Owens earned a Bachelor of Science in Physics and a Bachelor of Science in Astrophysics with a minor in Mathematics from the University of Cincinnati in April 2022, where he was a member of the University Honors Program, Cincinnatus Scholar, and Undergraduate Research Fellow. As an undergraduate, he conducted research at the University of Cincinnati and the Center for Gravitational Waves and Cosmology at West Virginia University. He instructed a physics learning community course for first-time physics majors for three consecutive years.

Following his graduation, Riley has worked as a postbaccalaureate researcher collaborating with groups at UC and elsewhere. His primary research interest is the impact of the most massive stars throughout time, especially in the early universe. As part of his work, he uses data collected from world-class ground- and space-based telescopes such as the Hubble Space Telescope. He is preparing two publications from the work he began at UC and has presented his results extensively at regional, national, and international conferences.

Outside of his work, he enjoys long phone calls with friends, spending time with his dog, and writing for Astrobites, a daily blog summarizing astronomy publications at the undergraduate level.