Nickolas (Nick) Kokron

I am interested in the large-scale structure of the Universe. That is, the statistical distribution of both visible and dark matter on scales of hundreds of Mpc. I study 'tracers' of this distribution, such as galaxies, using a combination of supercomputer simulations and pen-and-paper theory. By understanding this tracer-matter connection at high accuracy, I create powerful models for the subtle correlations in data collected by the many ongoing cosmic surveys. I hope to use these models to try to pin down the nature of the Universe's earliest moments — such as the mysterious epoch of inflation — as well as its eventual fate, by learning about the dark energy. More specifically, I have worked extensively on "effective field theory" models of large-scale structure as applied to galaxy clustering, its cross-correlation with lensing, and synergies with cosmological hydrodynamical simulations. More recent interests include the theory of "intrinsic alignments" — the correlations of galaxy shapes, novel forms of mapping the Universe through observations of atomic and molecular transition lines ("line intensity mapping"), and the epoch of reionization.