What does being a scientist mean to you?

To me, science is about thinking rationally, solving problems and enjoying learning new things about the universe.

People who are not professional scientists can also be scientists. This is the idea behind "citizen science" projects: https://www.zooniverse.org. You, too, can be a scientist, even if it’s only for an hour at a time!

Can you summarize the main focus of your research and what drew you to that field of study/work?

I use numerical simulations to model how stars like our sun formed. When I was a physics graduate student I was interested in working on some kind of computational modeling. It turns out there are a lot of really interesting complex problems in astrophysics that you can only study with large computers. The study of star formation has a lot of different physics in it: gravity, magnetic fields, turbulence, and radiation. These interact in nonlinear and sometimes unexpected ways, which make star formation a fun thing to model. I also use the simulations to make cool movie