Ph.D., Astronomy & Astrophysics, 2022, University of California, Santa Cruz

For Brittany Miles, her work is most meaningful when she collaborates with others to shed light on profound challenges. Brittany's expertise lies in mid-infrared observations of brown dwarfs -astronomical objects that share properties with both planets and stars. By placing unique constraints on the atmospheric structures of these cold objects, she provides a template for predicting and interpreting future direct images of cooler exoplanets. Her brown dwarf observations inform her work as an instrumentalist, where she retrofits and tests detector capabilities to support more precise characterization of exoplanets.