Name: Isobel Romero-Shaw (she/her)

Field: Gravitational Wave Astrophysics

Bio: I’m currently a PhD student at Monash university, Melbourne, Australia, but I was born and raised in the beautiful city of Bath, UK.

Likes: Snails, drawing, baking, being kind to the environment

Fun fact: I have had two pet Giant African Land snails. These are illegal in Australia, so now I have five pet garden snails, which live in a tank on my desk.

Contributions to Science: I study gravitational waves – tiny ripples in space-time. These tiny ripples are caused by colossal objects, like black holes, crashing into each other in distant galaxies. I try to work out how these colossal couples met each other in the first place. This involves analysing the gravitational-wave signals for characteristic wobbles, which can give us clues into the past lives of these enigmatic objects.

Further info: Website, Publications, Twitter, Art gallery