Annika Peter

RC Program: EEP/Transition School

Graduating Class: 2002

Major: Physics, Astronomy with minors in Mathematics and Geophysics

Discipline: Natural Sciences

Current Location: Columbus, OH

Region: East Coast

Current Job/Career:

Assistant Professor of Physics and Astronomy, The Ohio State University. I went to grad school in physics (Princeton) right after graduating from UW. After a three-year postdoc in theoretical astrophysics at Caltech, and a 2.5-year postdoc in the physics and astronomy department at UC Irvine, I moved to OSU in 2013 as an assistant professor. My husband (also an astrophysics professor) and I moved to OSU to solve our “two-body problem”, and it is an awesome match to our research interests and style of science. My main field of research is the nature of dark matter. Fun fact: we do not know what 96% of the Universe is made of, and of the 4% we do know about, most of it is in phases of matter (warm-ish gas) that makes it hard to observe. I study the 25% of the Universe that we call “dark matter”—we know that it is gravitationally attractive like normal matter, but we don’t know what it is. Figuring out what it is lies at the interface of particle physics and astrophysics. I also dabble in galaxy evolution and cosmic-ray astrophysics, partly because those fields are highly relevant to dark-matter searches, and partly because they are fun! I am also highly interested in issues of diversity and access in STEM. I love my current job a lot. Research, teaching, advising students, and being involved in the decision-making and culture of my departments and university are great! My colleagues are great!

Graduate School:

I went to Princeton University for grad school in physics, but my advisor was in the Department of Astrophysical Sciences (and then moved to a neighboring institution). So I have always straddled the line between physics and astronomy! Grad school was a very mixed experience for me. I think in retrospect I would have been better off if I had taken a break after grad school because the extra maturity would have helped negotiate some of the harder aspects of grad school. Grad school is completely different from undergrad in the sense that you don’t have fixed assignments or get a lot of feedback, and can be psychologically very, very hard. It is also very freeing, because you are producing new knowledge on exciting subjects, and there is a lot of autonomy. Also, you should take other life factors into account when choosing the right program. Even though the intellectual environment at Princeton was awesome, my advisor was great, and I had an amazing set of peers (including one whom I married!), Princeton is not a fun town in which to be a 20-year-old grad student. I don’t regret my choice of grad program, but wish I’d had the maturity to better negotiate the fact that I really hated where I lived. I have a lot more advice on finding the right grad program than will fit in this space!

Other Interests:

I do not really have a lot of hobbies, and will have time for even fewer once my baby arrives in a few weeks. My husband and I like eating spicy food and traveling. I also enjoy listening to podcasts and reading non-fiction (history and science fields outside my own), crime novels, and the sci-fi/fantasy novels of my youth.

If you could give yourself a superpower, what would it be?

I wish I could be like 1000x more efficient in working, or that I could teleport. Basically, anything that would let me get all the things done that I want to get done!

RC students and community members can contact me for:

• Going out for coffee or conversing over skype about life post-undergrad
• Help finding jobs or internships
• Quick questions over email