Dr Benjamin Pope is an Associate Professor in Statistical Data Science at Macquarie University at the Astrophysics and Space Technologies Research Centre. Since being awarded a DPhil in Astrophysics from the University of Oxford, Ben has been a NASA Sagan Postdoctoral Fellow and an ARC Decra Fellow, among other accomplishments. Ben is active in public science communication and other meaningful civil society engagement.
Listen using the audio player above or access the podcast via iTunes or Spotify (or search for “Wide Open Air Exchange” on your preferred podcast platform).
This is a great introduction to concepts related to Astrostatistics and Astrophysics and data science, and Ben’s approach of combining flexible statistical models with rigorous physical models.
There are discussions of astronomical imaging, philosophy of science debates in statistical inference reasoning, and some history of radio astronomy in Australia including the pioneering work of Ruby Payne-Scott.
A version of this conversation will be broadcast on radio 2SER 107.3FM Sydney on Monday 12th May 2025 at 630pm AEST.
Ben will be appearing at the Pint of Science Festival in Sydney on Monday 19th May 2025 at an event called ‘Solar Storms, Particle Power, and Data Footprints’.