Bonjour! Hola ! Hi! My name is Marie-Lou Gendron-Marsolais, I am Asst. Prof. at the Département de physique, de génie physique et d’optique of Université Laval since May 2024. I hold a Canada Research Chair in Galaxy Clusters Environments.
My research focus on groups and clusters of galaxies, the largest gravitationally bound structures in our Universe. I am interested in the study of the interaction of the powerful jets launch by supermassive black holes in central galaxies with the intracluster medium (ICM). This active galactic nuclei (AGN) feedback is believed to compensate the radiative loss of the ICM as this hot and diffuse plasma emits in the x-ray. In order to get a better understanding of this mechanism, I analyze radio (VLA), optical (SITELLE) and X-ray (Chandra) observations of nearby clusters and groups.
Before joining Université Laval, from 2021-2024, I worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía-CSIC, acting as SKAO Science Community Manager as part of with Lourdes Verdes-Montenegro’s team coordinating the Spanish participation in the SKAO. My role was to foster, promote and lead the formation of working groups of Spanish astronomers across different wavelengths and research areas to optimise the scientific return of the Spanish involvement in SKAO.
From 2018-2021, I have been an ESO fellow based in Santiago, Chile with duties at the ALMA observatory: I served as Astronomer on Duty at the ALMA Operation Support Facility, I performed data quality and calibration assessment as well as software testing and I was also part of the VLBI ALMA team, preparing and delivering these special observations.
I did my Ph. D at Université de Montréal (September 2014 to September 2018), supervised by Julie Hlavacek-Larrondo in the X-TRA astrophysics research group. I have also been visiting the Havard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics for six months (2015-2016), supervised by Ralph Kraft. I did my undergrad studies in physics at Université Laval in Québec city (2009-2012, with an admission excellence scholarship) and a master in theoretical particle physics (supervised by Richard MacKenzie, 2012-2014, with the Hubert-Reeves Scholar) at Université de Montréal, working on the impact of topological defects in certain cosmological models.
I have been a scientific communicator in astronomy at Mont-Mégantic national park (ASTROLab) for 3 summers on a full time basis (2010 to 2012), guiding visits of the Mont-Mégantic Observatory and animated evening astronomy activities (presentations and observations). I have also been teaching assistant (Université de Montréal 2013-2014) and tutor in physics (2011 to 2014).
I am also passionate about science outreach and solving the issues of diversity in science. In my spare time, I like the outdoors as well as sewing.
Marie-Lou Gendron-Marsolais 