Searching in the Sky: Black Holes and Hidden Particles

Masha Baryakhtar is Assistant Professor of Physics at the University of Washington. Professor Baryakhtar's research in theoretical particle physics focuses on ideas beyond the Standard Model and on creating new directions for testing them. This includes new physics that solves outstanding puzzles and which may be tested in colliders or in precision experiments;  pinning down the particle nature of dark matter using observations in the sky and in the lab; and the the broader intersection of particle theory with astroparticle physics, cosmology, and gravitational waves.

Born in Kharkiv, Ukraine, Professor Baryakhtar moved to the United States in middle school. She received her A.B. summa cum laude in Physics and Mathematics at Harvard University, and her Ph.D. in Physics at Stanford University. Prior to joining the faculty at the University of Washington in 2021, Baryakhtar was a Banting Postdoctoral Fellow at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics and a James Arthur Postdoctoral Fellow at the Center for Cosmology and Particle Physics at New York University.