Joshua S. Bloom

Joshua S. Bloom, recently a Sloan Research Fellow, is considered an expert on gamma-ray burst (GRB) afterglows; he has played a leading role in seminal efforts to uncover the nature of the progenitors of long and short GRBs as well as X-ray flashes. Bloom is Principal Investigator of the world's largest telescope project devoted to infrared transient observations (PAIRITEL, on Mt Hopkins, AZ), commissioned in 2006. PAIRITEL was used by Bloom and collaborators to find the first contemporaneous infrared afterglow of a GRB, place the limits on Earth-mass planets around brown dwarfs, and solidified the utility of IR observations of Type Ia supernovae for cosmology. Bloom is a well-rated Professor in undergraduate courses and an active lecturer in public forums in the Bay Area. He is Key Project leader in the Palomar Transients Factory, Co-I of an NSF and NASA-sponsored Virtual Observatory project on transients, leader of the GRB Science Working Group for the EXIST mission, and PI of the new Synoptic All-Sky Infrared Imaging Survey concept study (SASIR).

Biography Updated on 25 November 2008

Personal Home Page

http://astro.berkeley.edu/~jbloom/

Articles in Scholarly Journals [Incomplete List]

  1. On the Nature of Velocity Fields in High‐ z Galaxies
    The Astrophysical Journal, vol. 672, no. 1, pp. 59–71, 2008
  2. Observations of the 599 Hz Accreting X‐Ray Pulsar IGR J00291+5934 during the 2004 Outburst and in Quiescence
    The Astrophysical Journal, vol. 672, no. 2, pp. 1079–1090, 2008
  3. The Troublesome Broadband Evolution of GRB 061126: Does a Gray Burst Imply Gray Dust?
    The Astrophysical Journal, vol. 672, no. 1, pp. 449–464, 2008
  4. GRB 070610: A Curious Galactic Transient
    The Astrophysical Journal, vol. 678, no. 2, pp. 1127–1135, 2008
  5. Discovery of a Very Bright, Nearby Gravitational Microlensing Event
    The Astrophysical Journal, vol. 677, no. 2, pp. 1268–1277, 2008
  6. A New Low‐Mass Eclipsing Binary from SDSS‐II
    The Astrophysical Journal, vol. 684, no. 1, pp. 635–643, 2008
  7. Near-Infrared Monitoring of Ultracool Dwarfs: Prospects for Searching for Transiting Companions
    Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, vol. 120, no. 870, pp. 860–871, 2008
  8. The Interstellar Medium of Gamma-Ray Burst Host Galaxies. I. Echelle Spectra of Swift GRB Afterglows
    The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series, vol. 168, no. 2, pp. 231–267, 2007
  9. Keck and European Southern Observatory Very Large Telescope View of the Symmetry of the Ejecta of the XRF/SN 2006aj
    The Astrophysical Journal, vol. 661, no. 2, pp. 892–898, 2007
  10. On the Absence of Wind Signatures in GRB Afterglow Spectra: Constraints on the Wolf-Rayet Winds of GRB Progenitors
    The Astrophysical Journal, vol. 663, no. 1, pp. 420–436, 2007
  11. Multicolor Infrared Observations of SN 2006aj. I. The Supernova Associated with XRF 060218
    The Astrophysical Journal, vol. 663, no. 2, pp. 1180–1186, 2007
  12. Submillijansky Transients in Archival Radio Observations
    The Astrophysical Journal, vol. 666, no. 1, pp. 346–360, 2007
  13. SN 2006gy: Discovery of the Most Luminous Supernova Ever Recorded, Powered by the Death of an Extremely Massive Star like ? Carinae
    The Astrophysical Journal, vol. 666, no. 2, pp. 1116–1128, 2007
  14. Pulse Width Evolution of Late-Time X-Ray Flares in Gamma-Ray Bursts
    The Astrophysical Journal, vol. 667, no. 2, pp. 1024–1032, 2007
  15. Probing the Interstellar Medium near Star-forming Regions with Gamma-Ray Burst Afterglow Spectroscopy: Gas, Metals, and Dust
    The Astrophysical Journal, vol. 666, no. 1, pp. 267–280, 2007
  16. Super Star Cluster NGC 1705-1: A Local Analog to the Birth Site of Long-Duration ?-Ray Bursts
    The Astrophysical Journal, vol. 668, no. 1, pp. 384–391, 2007
  17. Missing Molecular Hydrogen and the Physical Conditions of GRB Host Galaxies
    The Astrophysical Journal, vol. 668, no. 2, pp. 667–673, 2007
  18. Near‐Infrared Interferometric, Spectroscopic, and Photometric Monitoring of T Tauri Inner Disks
    The Astrophysical Journal, vol. 669, no. 2, pp. 1072–1084, 2007
  19. A Complete Catalog of Swift Gamma‐Ray Burst Spectra and Durations: Demise of a Physical Origin for Pre‐ Swift High‐Energy Correlations
    The Astrophysical Journal, vol. 671, no. 1, pp. 656–677, 2007