Hello!

I'm Thea Kozakis, an astrophysicist/astrobiologist currently working at the Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía as a Severo Ochoa postdoctoral fellow. Right now I am particularly interested in using photochemistry and climate modeling to study how we could use ozone as a biosignature in the search for life in the Universe. I completed my PhD work at Cornell University with the Carl Sagan Institute. My PhD thesis, "Last Call For Life: Habitability of Terrestrial Planets Orbiting Red Giants and White Dwarfs", focuses on combining stellar evolution and astrobiology to study planetary habitability for systems with hosts of a variety of masses and ages. I got my start in astronomy doing observational research with Joe Carson at the College of Charleston on direct imaging of exoplanets around high-mass stars with the Subaru SEEDS Survey. After I got my PhD at Cornell I spent 4 years in Denmark as a post doc at the National Space Institute at the Technical University of Denmark with the exoplanet group. Although my current research focuses on exoplanet habitability and origins of life, I'm interested in a variety of different areas in astronomy research!

To learn more about me and the work that I've done/am doing please take a look at the links above/below! Don't hesistate to contact me with any thoughts/questions/ideas/etc.

The beautiful cover art shown above is an artist's conception of my white dwarf habitability research made by my good friend, Jack Madden, who holds both a PhD in astrophysics and a Master of Fine Arts. You can find out more about his space art and exoplanet research here!