Jose Palencia » Directory All A-Z

Biographical Info

I am a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Toronto (David A. Dunlap Department of Astronomy & Astrophysics), and my passion lies in gravitational lensing — nature’s own cosmic magnifying glass. I focus on massive galaxy clusters, which bend and amplify the light of distant background objects, turning them into powerful natural telescopes. Through this lens — quite literally — I investigate how matter is distributed within these colossal structures, and push even further by testing different dark matter candidate models to understand what these clusters are actually made of.
One of the most exciting aspects of my work is hunting for individual stars at cosmological distances, objects so remote that they would normally be completely invisible to us, but which gravitational lensing brings briefly into reach. I combine photometric and spectroscopic analysis across the optical and infrared, making the most of the incredible capabilities of HST and JWST to catch and characterize these rare, fleeting detections.
My scientific curiosity doesn’t stop there. I have dabbled in CMB science using data from the Planck mission, exploring machine learning approaches to galaxy cluster detection, and I keep a keen eye on developments in cosmology and multi-messenger astronomy more broadly. I genuinely enjoy stepping outside my comfort zone and learning new things!