Regular biography
Katelyn Breivik is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Physics at Carnegie Mellon University. Her research focuses on astrophysics and cosmology, particularly the role of binary stars in shaping stellar populations across various astrophysical contexts. She works at the intersection of theory, simulations, and data to study binary star interactions and their impact on astrophysical phenomena. Breivik develops software tools for simulating binary populations and analyzing data from electromagnetic surveys and gravitational wave observatories. Her work includes projects such as COSMIC and LEGWORK, which are publicly available on GitHub. She is also committed to scientific reproducibility through practices like showyourwork.
Scholar-generated biography
Katelyn Breivik is a researcher at Carnegie Mellon University with a focus on binary stars, gravitational waves, astronomical surveys, and compact object binaries. Her work explores the astrophysical implications of gravitational wave sources, particularly in the context of binary black holes and neutron star–black hole systems. Breivik investigates the formation channels of binary systems, their detectability with space-based observatories like LISA, and the role of astronomical surveys in identifying potential gravitational wave sources. Her research also addresses the impact of common envelope processes, mass transfer, and galactic structure on the evolution of compact binaries. She has contributed to studies on the detection of stellar black holes using Gaia and the development of computational tools for gravitational wave source characterization.