Physics researcher Skyler Palatnick awarded 51 Pegasi b Fellowship
Lightweight metasurface optics promise to reveal hidden exoplanets and signs of life beyond our solar system
Astrophysics doctoral candidate Skyler Palatnick has been named to the Heising-Simons Foundation’s 2026 class of 51 Pegasi b Fellows. The highly competitive three-year postdoctoral fellowship provides up to $450,000 to support theoretical, observational and experimental research in planetary astronomy.
Palatnick’s research addresses a fundamental challenge: the extreme brightness of stars obscures their planets. Working within the Department of Physics, he designs lightweight, compact metasurfaces to be used in coronagraphs — instruments that block starlight to make faint planets visible. He plans to extend this technology into ultraviolet wavelengths to detect chemical signatures associated with biological processes, potentially aiding the search for signs of life in future space observatory missions.
"His work in my group has opened up a whole new research field for us, metasurface optics," said his advisor, assistant professor Max Millar-Blanchaer. "This technology may one day lead to the discovery of new planets around other stars. It's difficult to understate the impact he has had on the development of this technology. With this new fellowship he'll expand upon the techniques he developed and take them into exciting new directions." Read the full story on The Current.
