Dr Roger Wesson

Research summary

I work on various topics related to the deaths of stars. Supernovae are thought to be the source of much of the dust in the universe, and almost all of it in very young galaxies, but how and when they form the dust is not well understood. I look for evidence of dust formation in supernova remnants, and around supernova progenitors, to try to determine this. I'm also interested in planetary nebulae, the remnants of lower mass stars. Some planetary nebulae show extreme so-called "abundance discrepancies", which are associated with close binary central stars. I'm working on better understanding how whether the central star is binary or not affects the nebular chemistry so strongly.

Teaching summary

Publications