Daniel Huber
Associate Professor at the Institute for Astronomy, University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa
Aloha! I am an associate professor at the Institute for Astronomy (IfA) of the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa. Our research group focuses on the study of fundamental properties of stars and stellar populations in our galaxy, as well as the discovery and characterization of exoplanets.
I was born and raised in Vienna, Austria, and earned my PhD in Astrophysics at the University of Sydney, Australia. I then worked as a member of the Kepler team at NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View, California, before returning to the University of Sydney to take up an ARC DECRA fellowship. In January 2017 I joined the faculty at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa.
Research
Our group is leading research projects broadly related to the study of stars and exoplanets in our galaxy. For a publication list, see the NASA ADS listing of my refereed publications, my ORCID profile and my Google Scholar profile.
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Asteroseismology -
Exoplanets -
Optical Long-Baseline Interferometry -
Stellar Populations of Transit Surveys -
Galactic Archeology -
Adaptive Optics Imaging
Group
Postdoctoral
- 2023–Present
Yaguang Li Parrent Fellow
- 2022–Present
Daniel Hey Postdoctoral Researcher
- 2023–2026
Theron Carmichael NSF Postdoctoral Fellow
- 2020–2023
Marc Hon Hubble Fellow
- 2018–2021
Jamie Tayar Hubble Fellow
- 2018–2021
Lauren Weiss Parrent Fellow
Postgraduate, post PhD-candidature
- 2024–Present
Ian Berry PhD, UH/IfA
- 2020–2025
Nicholas Saunders PhD, UH/IfA, NSF Graduate Research Fellow
- 2019–2024
Casey Brinkman PhD, UH/IfA, NSF Graduate Research Fellow, co-advised with Lauren Weiss
- 2020–2024
Jingwen Zhang PhD, UH/IfA, NASA FINESST Fellow, co-advised with Lauren Weiss and Mike Bottom
- 2017–2022
Ashley Chontos PhD, UH/IfA, NSF Graduate Research Fellow
- 2017–2021
Travis Berger PhD, UH/IfA, NASA FINESST Fellow
- 2019–2020
Larissa Nofi PhD, UH/IfA
- 2015–2019
Sam Grunblatt PhD, UH/IfA
- 2015–2019
Isabel Colman PhD, University of Sydney, co-advised with Tim Bedding
- 2015–2019
Jie Yu PhD, University of Sydney, co-advised with Tim Bedding
Postgraduate, pre PhD-candidature
- Emma McIntyre 2025
- Lanxuan (Rita) Wang 2024
- Elina Zhang 2023, co-advised with Theron Carmichael
- Aldo Sepulveda 2021–2024
- Keyan Gootkin 2022, co-advised with Marc Hon
- Aleezah Ali 2021
- Vanshree Bhalotia 2019
- Erica Bufanda 2019, co-advised with Jamie Tayar
- Maryum Sayeed 2019
- Connor Auge 2018
- Jessica Stasik 2018
Undergraduate (2017 onwards)
- Hyde Kenney 2026
- Makaena Hewitt 2025
- Ciana-Lei Bence 2024
- Camille Chiu 2024
- Kenta Sakamoto 2023
- Mia Mansfield 2023
- Jack Kohm 2023
- Alicia Chun 2023
- Aidan Chun 2023
- JC Dumaslan 2022
- Kaleo Toguchi-Tan 2022
- Jessica Nagasako 2022
- Luke Benavitz 2022
- Kiana Ejercito 2022
- Madison Hara 2021
- Jay Baptista 2021
- Tets Nagashima 2021
- Linnea Wolniewicz 2020
- Michael Greklek-McKeon 2018
- Oana Vesa 2017
Outreach & Press
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August 2026
UH innovation, astronomers help power NASA's newest space telescope
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April 2026
UH discovery on Maunakea sheds light on brown dwarfs
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May 2025
Maunakea telescope tunes into music of nearby star, unveils surprising discovery
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November 2024
UH Mānoa scholars named among the world's most cited researchers
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June 2024
UH astronomers part of NASA's $19.5M artificial star mission
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May 2024
UH astronomers uncover array of strange exoplanet worlds
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November 2023
World's most influential researchers list features UH scientists
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June 2023
Astronomers puzzled by planet that should not exist
Show earlier press, 2011–2022
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December 2022
Planet spiraling to its doom discovered by UH astronomers
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November 2022
UH scientists among world's most influential researchers
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September 2022
Undergrads from Hawaii help map galaxy through Scialog team's collaboration
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August 2022
Exoplanets: the hunt for life in the universe
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January 2022
Newly-discovered planets will be “swallowed” by their star
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December 2021
4 top UH researchers recognized for global excellence
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August 2021
NASA's TESS tunes into an all-sky symphony of red giant stars
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June 2021
IfA students receive research, teaching accolades
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January 2021
Planets can shrink? UH astronomers find new evidence
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November 2020
$5M award aids search for a “recipe” for habitable worlds
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September 2020
UH astronomers to construct 3D map of Milky Way galaxy
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May 2020
Board of Regents honors faculty for excellence in research
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May 2020
UH astronomers decipher rhythm among young stars
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July 2019
NASA awards grant to UH graduate student Travis Berger
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March 2019
Kepler Space Telescope's first exoplanet candidate confirmed, ten years after launch (Chontos et al. 2019)
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February 2019
University of Hawaiʻi astronomer awarded prestigious Sloan Foundation Fellowship
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July 2018
Symphony of stars: the science of stellar sound waves
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2018
Revised radii of Kepler stars and planets using Gaia Data Release 2 (Berger et al. 2018)
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March 2018
UH astronomers to uncover the secrets of stars and exoplanets with NASA's TESS satellite
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2017
Newly discovered twin planets could solve puffy planet mystery (Grunblatt et al. 2017)
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2017
Stellar variability in the Seven Sisters of the Pleiades cluster (White et al. 2017)
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2016
Discovery of magnetic fields in the cores of red giant stars (Stello et al. 2016, Nature)
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2015
Discovery of a near Earth-sized planet in the habitable zone of a Sun-like star (Jenkins et al. 2015)
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2015
Discovery of the oldest known system of sub Earth-sized planets (Campante et al. 2015)
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2013
Discovery of the first spin-orbit misalignment in a multiplanet system (Huber et al. 2013, Science)
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2011
NASA/KASC press conference announcing Kepler asteroseismology results (Huber et al. 2011)
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2011
Discovery of the triply eclipsing triple system HD 181096, “Trinity” (Derekas et al. 2011, Science)
- 2011
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2011–2018
Asteroseismology meets contemporary art: collaborations with New York-based artist Jeff Talman
Talks
Recorded
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February 2025
How Well Do We Know Our Stars? Know Thy Star, Know Thy Planet 2, Caltech, Pasadena, CA
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July 2022
Asteroseismology of Cool Dwarfs with Extreme Precision Radial Velocities EPRV Research Coordination Network Colloquium
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July 2022
Asteroseismology & Exoplanets with the Roman Space Telescope 2022 TASC Workshop, Leuven, Belgium
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July 2022
Astrometry and Exoplanet Host Star Properties Invited lecture, 2022 Sagan Workshop, Caltech, Pasadena, CA
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August 2019
Solar-Like Oscillations: Lessons Learned and First Results from TESS Invited talk, Stars and their Variability from Space, Vienna, Austria. Starts at ~1:37
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May 2019
Asteroseismology for Exoplaneteers KITP, UC Santa Barbara
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August 2017
Asteroseismology with WFIRST Invited lecture, 2017 Sagan Workshop, Caltech, Pasadena, CA
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February 2015
Asteroseismology with Red Giants Invited talk, KITP Conference: The Milky Way and its Stars, Santa Barbara, CA
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February 2015
Asteroseismology Data Analysis Tutorial KITP, UC Santa Barbara
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April 2014
Towards Improved Occurrence Rates of Exoplanets SETI Institute, Mountain View, CA
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November 2013
Asteroseismology of Exoplanet Host Stars Invited talk, Second Kepler Science Conference, NASA Ames, Mountain View, CA
Invited talks and colloquia
- January 2027
Plenary talk, AAS 249, Salt Lake City, UT
- August 2026
Roman Space Telescope Launch Science Meeting, Cocoa Beach, FL
- November 2025
Signal in the Noise Workshop, Ringberg Castle, Germany
- July 2025
Kepler/TESS Asteroseismic Science Consortium Conference, Vienna, Austria
- February 2025
Know Thy Star, Know Thy Planet 2, Caltech, Pasadena, CA
- July 2024
Invited lecturer, Porto Summer School on Asteroseismology, Vila do Conde, Portugal
- July 2023
ACAMAR 9: Australia China Workshop on Astrophysics, Perth, Australia
- November 2022
EPRV Research Coordination Network Colloquium, online
- October 2022
Colloquium, Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, MD
- July 2022
Invited lecturer, NASA Sagan Workshop, Caltech, Pasadena, CA
- March 2022
Colloquium, Caltech, Pasadena, CA
Show earlier talks, 2012–2021
- December 2021
Colloquium, Flatiron Institute / CCA, New York City, NY
- December 2021
Colloquium, Nanjing University, online
- December 2020
Department of Earth & Planetary Sciences Seminar, Tokyo Institute of Technology, online
- July 2020
Exoplanets III Conference, Heidelberg, Germany, online
- January 2020
Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer Special Session, AAS, Honolulu, HI
- January 2020
Imaging Stars Special Session, AAS, Honolulu, HI
- 2019
Dynamics of the Sun & Stars: Honoring the Life and Work of Michael Thompson, Boulder, CO
- August 2019
Stars and Their Variability Observed from Space, Vienna, Austria
- July 2019
Fourth TESS Asteroseismic Science Consortium Conference, MIT, Cambridge, MA
- January 2019
TESS Special Session, AAS, Seattle, WA
- January 2019
Kepler and K2's 500,000 High-Precision Light Curves, AAS, Seattle, WA
- October 2018
Science with SONG: 4 More Years, Tenerife, Spain
- September 2018
A Revolution in Stellar Physics with Gaia & Large Surveys, Warsaw, Poland
- March 2018
Astrophysics Science Division Colloquium, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, MD
- December 2017
Exoplanets and Planet Formation, Shanghai, China
- October 2017
Know Thy Star, Know Thy Planet, Caltech, Pasadena, CA
- August 2017
Invited lecturer, NASA Sagan Workshop, Caltech, Pasadena, CA
- July 2017
Third TESS Asteroseismic Science Consortium Conference, Birmingham, UK
- March 2017
Colloquium, Columbia University, New York, NY
- July 2016
Invited lecturer, International Advanced School in Space Sciences, Azores, Portugal
- November 2015
K2 Science Conference, Santa Barbara, CA
- October 2015
New Horizons in Astronomy: Frank N. Bash Symposium, Austin, TX
- August 2015
Advances in Stellar Physics from Asteroseismology, IAU General Assembly, Honolulu, HI
- August 2015
Chaos Among the Stars, Institute for Astronomy, University of Hawaiʻi, Honolulu, HI
- July 2015
Annual Scientific Meeting of the Astronomical Society of Australia, Perth, Australia
- June 2015
Kepler & TESS Asteroseismic Science Consortium Conference, Aarhus, Denmark
- April 2015
Colloquium, Australian National University, Canberra, ACT
- March 2015
Colloquium, University of Hawaiʻi, Honolulu, HI
- March 2015
Colloquium, Georgia State University, Atlanta, GA
- March 2015
Colloquium, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA
- February 2015
Colloquium, Yale University, New Haven, CT
- February 2015
The Milky Way and its Stars, KITP, UC Santa Barbara, CA
- 2015
Colloquium, University of Colorado Boulder, Boulder, CO
- August 2014
LAMOST-Kepler Workshop, Beijing, China
- June 2014
18th Cambridge Workshop on Cool Stars, Stellar Systems, and the Sun, Flagstaff, AZ
- April 2014
Colloquium, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON
- April 2014
Colloquium, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL
- November 2013
Second Kepler Science Conference, NASA Ames Research Center, Mountain View, CA
- September 2013
Colloquium, Ohio State University, Columbus, OH
- July 2013
Giants of Eclipse, AAS Topical Conference, Monterey, CA
- June 2013
Sixth Kepler Asteroseismic Science Consortium Conference, Sydney, Australia
- January 2013
Kepler Special Session, 221st AAS Meeting, Long Beach, CA
- January 2013
Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope Network, Santa Barbara, CA
- June 2012
Fifth Kepler Asteroseismic Science Consortium Conference, Balatonalmádi, Hungary
Teaching
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2025-2026
Foundations of Astrophysics II University of Hawaiʻi ASTR242
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2024
Data Science in Astronomy University of Sydney PHYS2X14
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2023–2024
From Earth to Exoplanets University of Sydney OLE1636
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2023
Oscillations & Waves University of Sydney PHYS1002 Fundamentals
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Fall 2022
Foundations of Astrophysics I University of Hawaiʻi ASTR241
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Spring 2019, 2021
Planetary Systems: A Data-Driven Exploration University of Hawaiʻi ASTR735
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Spring 2018, 2020, 2022
Radiative Transfer and Stellar Atmospheres University of Hawaiʻi ASTR631
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Fall 2017
Coding Practices University of Hawaiʻi AST699DR
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Ongoing
Astro-ph Seminar University of Hawaiʻi AST734/735/790
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2016
Oscillations & Waves University of Sydney PHYS1001 Regular
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2014
Interferometry & Asteroseismology Cape Breton University, undergraduate guest lecture
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2012
Asteroseismology UC Santa Cruz ASTR-112, graduate guest lectures