Amina Helmi

This PhD project focuses on understanding how the Milky Way and its nearest neighbours formed, and on placing the Local Group in a cosmological context. The work sits at the intersection of galactic archaeology , astrophysics , and cosmological modelling , using the fossil record of stars in the Milky Way, M31, and their satellites to reconstruct their assembly histories. You will co-develop a sophisticated suite of Local Group models and use new initial conditions from the team’s recent technology to run and analyse hydrodynamical simulations of galaxy formation. The research will connect the simulated evolution of gas, stars, and dark matter with observational datasets, helping identify the physical mechanisms at play, revealing where the models need improvement, and generating predictions and new tests of the cosmological model. The position is based at the University of Groningen’s Kapteyn Astronomical Institute within the Faculty of Science and Engineering. The institute is described as a major Dutch astronomy centre with strong links to NOVA, SRON, ASTRON, and the Dutch Origins Center, and it offers an internationally connected research environment. The project is jointly supervised by Prof. Amina Helmi at Groningen and Dr Ruediger Pakmor at the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics, and you will also work in an international collaboration with colleagues in Paris and Stockholm. The institute notes that English is the common language spoken there.

PhD project: Placing the Local Group in a cosmological context This doctoral project examines how the Milky Way, Andromeda (M31), and their satellite galaxies formed and evolved. The research is situated at the intersection of Galactic Archaeology, galaxy formation, and cosmology, using the fossil record preserved in stars to reconstruct the assembly history of the Local Group. The PhD researcher will co-develop a sophisticated suite of cosmological models of Local Group galaxies. Using newly generated initial conditions, they will carry out and analyze high-resolution hydrodynamical simulations of gas, stars, and dark matter. By comparing the simulations with observational datasets, the project will investigate the mechanisms shaping the spatial, dynamical, and chemical structure of the Milky Way and M31, identify where models require improvement, generate observational predictions, and develop new tests of the standard cosmological model. The researcher will be jointly supervised by Professor Amina Helmi at the University of Groningen and Dr Ruediger Pakmor at the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics in Garching. The project is part of an international collaboration involving colleagues in Paris and Stockholm. The position is based within the Kapteyn Astronomical Institute, part of the Faculty of Science and Engineering and the Netherlands Research School for Astronomy. The institute provides an internationally connected research environment with collaborations involving SRON, ASTRON, and astronomy and science institutes across the Netherlands. English is the common language of the institute.