PhD Defense: Anna Walde Brings Machine Learning to Exoplanets

On August 26, 2025, Anna Walde successfully defended her PhD thesis "From Grid Models to Machine Learning: Advancing Atmospheric Characterisation of Brown Dwarfs and Exoplanets."

Anna Walde during her PhD thesis defense on August 26, 2025. ©Anna Walde

Congratulations to Dr. Anna Walde on this incredible achievement in developing our understanding of exoplanetary atmospheres and the application of Machine Learning!

Publications:

Lueber, Anna; Karchev, Konstantin; Fisher, Chloe; Heim, Matthias; Trotta, Roberto, and Heng, Kevin (2025). Near-instantaneous Atmospheric Retrievals and Model Comparison with FASTER. The Astrophysical Journal Letters 984:L32. American Astronomical Society 10.3847/2041-8213/adc7aa

Lueber, Anna; Heng, Kevin; Bowler, Brendan P.; Kitzmann, Daniel; Vos, Johanna M., and Zhou, Yifan. (2024). Retrieved atmospheric properties of the sub-stellar object VHS 1256 b with HST, VLT, and JWST spectra. Astronomy & Astrophysics 690:A357. EDP Sciences 10.1051/0004-6361/202451301

Lueber, Anna; Kitzmann, Daniel; Fisher, Chloe E.; Bowler, Brendan P.; Burgasser, Adam J.; Marley, Mark, and Heng, Kevin (2023). Intercomparison of Brown Dwarf Model Grids and Atmospheric Retrieval Using Machine Learning. The Astrophysical Journal 954:22. American Astronomical Society 10.3847/1538-4357/ace530

Lueber, Anna; Kitzmann, Daniel; Bowler, Brendan P.; Burgasser, Adam J., and Heng, Kevin (2022). Retrieval Study of Brown Dwarf across the L-T Sequence. The Astrophysical Journal 930:136. American Astronomical Society 10.3847/1538-4357/ac63b9