Hello! My name is Ben Capistrant, I am an Astronomy Ph.D. student at the University of Florida, working with Dr. Jason Dittmann studying exoplanets and their host stars. My current work focuses on high-resolution spectroscopy of exoplanet atmospheres. In my previous projects, I worked with data from the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) mission with the goal of furthering our understanding of exoplanet-star interactions.

I graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with dual B.S. degrees in Physics and Astronomy-Physics from the School of Letters and Science, and a certificate (minor) in Mathematics. At UW I researched under NASA Hubble Postdoctoral Fellow Melinda Soares-Furtado, Prof. Ke Zhang, Dr. Adam Shaefer and Prof. Christy Tremonti, and Prof. Andrew Vanderburg at MIT. I worked on projects on a variety of topics ranging from locating density-bound HII regions in star-forming galaxies, CO abundance in protoplanetary disks, to eventually the field of stars and exoplanets, which I continue to research now.

Check out my Research page for more information on both my previous and current projects!

Hobbies

Outside of astronomy I enjoy traveling and landscape photography (some shots from my travels can be seen below). I also enjoy music and play the drums, guitar, piano, and just about any instrument I can get my hands on.

While researching, I've developed a great interest in scientific visualization. I've created drawings, diagrams, animations, and renders like the ones on my visualizations page with a variety of creative tools.