Caitlin Casey

Casey's interest in astronomy began as a child when she was given the opportunity to visit the planetarium in Rock Bridge High School in her hometown of Columbia, Missouri.

Casey completed her bachelor's degrees in physics, astronomy and applied mathematics from the University of Arizona in 2007. She attributes her decision to attend Arizona from first attending their Astronomy Camp during high school. She then obtained her Ph.D. in Astronomy from the University of Cambridge in 2010 under a Gates Cambridge Scholarship. While in Cambridge she served as president of the Gates Scholars' Society from 2009-2010. Casey was subsequently a NASA Hubble Postdoctoral Fellow at the Institute for Astronomy, University of Hawai’i at Mānoa, and then she spent two years as a postdoc at the University of California, Irvine as a McCue Postdoctoral Fellow of Cosmology. Casey became assistant professor in the Department of Astronomy at the University of Texas at Austin in 2015. Since 2021, Casey is an associate professor.

Dr. Casey's research has often focused on observations of the most extreme star-forming galaxies in the Universe. Galaxies with star-formation rates several hundreds to thousands times that of the Milky Way are responsible for building most of the stars ever formed in the Universe. Such galaxies also pose a unique challenge to cosmological simulations and the formation of massive reservoirs of gas, dust within a billion years after the Big Bang. To date, they have been very difficult to study with optical telescopes because they are also extremely dusty and gas-rich, so learning more about their physical mechanisms requires observations at submillimeter to radio wavelengths, where cold gas and dust emit energy.

Casey is known for her research, specifically on the most massive and luminous galaxies in the Universe. While in Hawaii, she examined the formation of starburst galaxies,[5] research that was conducted with the largest spectroscopic survey using the W.M. Keck Observatory of submillimeter-luminous galaxies detected by the Herschel Space Observatory.[6][7] While at the University of California, Irvine Casey authored a review paper on star-forming galaxies.[8] Casey is principal investigator of the COSMOS-Web Survey[9][10] and the Cosmic Evolution Survey. This work is a collaborative effort with Jeyhan Kartaltepe.[11] The COSMOS-Web Survey is a 0.54deg2 James Webb Space Telescope NIRCam imaging program that aims to reveal the sources of cosmic reionization and was the telescope's largest allocated project in its first year of observations.[12] She presented the initial results of her research with the COSMOS-Web survey in 2023.[13]

Casey is an advocate for equity in STEM, creating the TAURUS program, a summer research experience for marginalized students in the summer of 2016.[14] This program is hosted at the University of Texas at Austin at the McDonald Observatory and allows under-represented undergraduate students to get involved with astronomical research. Casey created a workshop designed to spread awareness about bullying, microaggressions and harassment for academic researchers with her colleague Kartik Sheth called The Ethical Gray Zone in 2013.