Lorena Hernández-García

Assistant Professor

My research focuses on the study of active galactic nuclei (AGN), which are accreting supermassive black holes located at the centers of galaxies. I am particularly interested in how they accrete material and how they interact with their immediate surroundings.

Projects

My work is centered on multiwavelength studies of active galactic nuclei, with a special focus on their variability. Using data across different wavelengths allows us to connect various emission regions and explore their physical properties. This includes studying the accretion disk, the corona, the broad and narrow line regions, the torus, and relativistic jets. Variability provides powerful insights into emission mechanisms, geometry, and the size scales of the nuclear regions.

I work with X-ray data from space-based telescopes such as XMM-Newton, Swift, and Chandra; optical data from the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) and, soon, from the Vera C. Rubin Observatory; optical and infrared spectra obtained with telescopes in Chile; and radio data from facilities including the VLA, VLBA, GMRT, and Effelsberg.

Highlights

I am part of the ALeRCE broker, the Chilean official broker for the Vera Rubin Observatory (https://alerce.science/)
I am part of the AGN Science Collaboration (AGN-SC) of the Vera Rubin Observatory (https://agn.science.lsst.org/)
I am part of a Chilean-based 4MOST community survey (ChANGES; https://www.eso.org/sci/publications/messenger/archive/no.190-mar23/messenger-no190-34-37.pdf)
I am part of the global network of robotic telescopes BOOTES (https://bootesnetwork.com/)