Anna Frebel is Professor of Physics and Division Head for Astrophysics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), contributing to Space Science through her groundbreaking research. She obtained her PhD from the Australian National University’s Mt. Stromlo Observatory in 2007. Her postdoctoral appointments included the WJ McDonald Fellowship at the University of Texas at Austin (2006-2008) and the Clay Fellowship at the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian (2009-2012). Frebel joined MIT’s Physics Department in 2012 as Assistant Professor, advancing to Associate Professor with tenure in 2018 and full Professor in 2022. Her accolades include the 2010 Annie Jump Cannon Award from the American Astronomical Society, the 2013 NSF CAREER Award, the 2009 Ludwig-Biermann Young Astronomer Award from the German Astronomical Society, the 2022 American Physical Society Fellowship, and the 2007 Charlene Heisler Prize for the best Australian astronomy PhD thesis.

As an observational astrophysicist, Frebel specializes in discovering and analyzing the oldest, most metal-poor stars in the Milky Way halo and its dwarf satellite galaxies, employing high-resolution spectroscopy with the Magellan telescopes. This work illuminates stellar archaeology, near-field cosmology, the properties of the first stars, supernova nucleosynthesis, r-process enrichment, and the chemical evolution and assembly of the Milky Way. She has published over 160 papers in refereed journals, including notable works such as “R-process enrichment from a single event in an ancient dwarf galaxy” (Ji et al., Nature, 2016), “Near-field cosmology with extremely metal-poor stars” (Frebel & Norris, Annual Review of Astronomy and Astrophysics, 2015), and “Nucleosynthetic signatures of the first stars” (Frebel et al., Nature, 2005). Additionally, she authored the popular science book “Searching for the Oldest Stars: Ancient Relics from the Early Universe” (Princeton University Press, 2015). Frebel impacts the field through public lectures, magazine articles, and by leading the LEAPS leadership program for MIT graduate students and postdocs.

Professional Email: afrebel@mit.edu