Shanika Galaudage
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astronerdika.bsky.social
Shanika Galaudage
@astronerdika.bsky.social
1.7K followers 210 following 300 posts
🕵️ Investigator of ripples in space-time | Astrophysicist
✨ Postdoc fellow | CIERA + Adler Planetarium 🇺🇸

linktr.ee/astronerdika | 🇦🇺🇱🇰(she/her)
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astronerdika.bsky.social
Thrilled to be named a #STEMpals ‘Curiosity Communicator’ 🥰

STEMpals is a program that connects kids in years 5 and 6 in Aussie classrooms with STEM professionals through letters! ✉️

The goal? To form a connection and spark curiosity in STEM. ✨

#SciComm #WomenInSTEM
Astrophysicist Shanika Galaudage is featured in a promotional graphic titled “Celebrating Curiosity Communicators.” The graphic includes the words “Communication • Curiosity • Connection.” A quote reads: “To me, doing STEM is about being curious, spotting patterns, and exploring new ideas. They are just some of the reasons why I love being a scientist!” Shanika’s name and title appear in a maroon banner, and a portrait of her smiling with long dark hair and a maroon top is shown on the right.
November 18, 2025 at 5:11 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
Celebrated my first Halloween in the states with folks at @nuciera.bsky.social 🧡✨

Looks like I came back from a trip…

I’ll note my previous place of employment was in France 🇫🇷 #HappyHalloween! 🎃
Shanika dressed up as a “Louvre Jewellery Robber” wearing a crown, black beanie, black face mask, neon yellow safety vest, and black clothes poses indoors holding a black tote bag that says “UNTITLED COLLECTION OF OBJECTS”. They are in an office environment. A black tote bag with white text reading “untitled collection of objects“ is laid flat, topped with a jewel crown. In front of it there are two small white drawstring pouches and an arrangement of large and small emeralds spread out decoratively on a table, somewhat resembling a broken down necklace. A hand holds a small white drawstring pouch over a table scattered with emeralds (possibly broken off some stolen Louvre jewellery) and printed Halloween notes reading, “You are an awesome colleague! Have a Fab-boo-lous HALLOWEEN.” But the word colleague is strikes out and replaced with accomplice. A black tote bag with white text reading “UNTITLED COLLECTION OF OBJECTS” sits on a table with a jeweled gold crown resting on top. In front of the bag, there’s a hand pointing to a hand-drawn floor map labeled “THE LOUVRE” and “1ST FLOOR,” with handwritten notes marking places like “Apollo Gallery” and “Napoleon III apartments.” A person (Shanika) is pointing to the Apollo Gallery and has labelled it with “Enter here”
November 1, 2025 at 4:58 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
Sorry, I missed this!

So this forbidden region is related to a process called "pair-instability". Essentially, for some mass range, massive stars don't form black holes when they die, instead, they completely blow up! Leaving nothing behind.

📷 Farag et al 2022 [arXiv:2208.09624]
Diagram showing how black hole mass depends on the helium core mass of a star. Core-collapse supernovae form black holes below ~45 M☉ and above ~130 solar masses. Between ~45–130 solar masses, pulsational pair-instability and pair-instability supernovae prevent black hole formation, creating a "black hole mass gap" from ~50–120 solar masses. Additional labels indicate ignition processes and core temperatures.
September 26, 2025 at 1:11 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
Mirror, mirror, reflecting our [LASER] beam...
What is the loudest [gravitational wave] signal that we've seen?

It’s #GW250114!

(Yes, it’s been two weeks since it was announced, but I can still celebrate! 🎉 )

#EinsteinWasRight #HawkingWasRight
@ligo.org @egovirgo.bsky.social
An infographic created by @astronerdika titled “MIRROR, MIRROR, reflecting our LASER beam… what’s the LOUDEST signal gravitational wave we’ve seen?” explaining the gravitational-wave discovery GW250114 and how the observation confirms Hawking’s area law. The visual shows the mirrors in a gravitational-wave interferometer speaking about the loudest event they have seen. There are several illustrations as follows: 1. A simplified diagram of a laser interferometer. A red laser beam from a labeled “LASER source” hits a beam splitter, travels down two perpendicular arms, reflects off round mirrors, and recombines at a labeled “detector.” A label near the top-right mirror reads: “the DETECTOR, signal seen by LIGO Hanford & LIGO Livingston.”
 2. An illustration of a binary black hole merger, with two black circles spiraling inward. They are labeled ~34 solar masses and ~32 solar masses. Surrounding spiral lines represent gravitational waves. A nearby caption reads: “the SOURCE, Discovered in 2025, on January 14, at 08:22:03 UTC.” 3. A prominent speech bubble with white text on a purple background states: “GW250114 is the loudest & clearest signal we’ve seen!” A smaller note below reads: “as of January 2025.” 4. Another speech bubble reads: “AND we saw that Hawking was right too!” 5. Visual explanation of Hawking’s Area Law. Two small circles labeled “this BH” + “this BH” are shown to the left of a “<” symbol, pointing to a larger circle labeled “the surface area of the merged BH.” Below there is the explanatory sentence: “GW250114’s remnant event horizon area is larger than the sum of the individual areas.” 6. A section titled “the PAPERS” lists two arXiv references: https://arxiv.org/abs/2509.08054 and https://www.arxiv.org/abs/2509.08099 Note: This infographic plays off the classic line from Snow White, “Mirror, mirror on the wall…” Here, the “mirrors” are the ones inside the laser interferometer, reflecting light to detect passing gravitational waves.
September 26, 2025 at 12:56 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
"LMXB" = Low Mass X-ray Binary.

The diagram below illustrates the anatomy of an LMXB with a #NeutronStar. One of my favourite LMXBs is Scorpius X-1 💚

DYK Sco X-1 is the second brightest X-ray source in our sky?! It is only defeated by our Sun ☀️

#NeutronStarWeek
A detailed scientific illustration by @astronerdika depicting the anatomy of a low-mass X-ray binary (LMXB) system. On the right side of the image is a large, orangeish/yellowish star labelled "low mass companion star." Gas from this star is flowing toward the left, through a narrow stream labelled "mass transfer via filled Roche lobe," into an accretion disk around a much smaller, dense object labelled "neutron star." The accretion disk is bright and disk-shaped, spiralling around the neutron star at the centre. A region where the gas stream impacts the outer edge of the disk is labelled "hot spot (bright in optical emission)." The neutron star, at the core of the disk, is further zoomed in on with an inset box at the bottom left of the image. In the inset, magnetic field lines are illustrated surrounding the neutron star. The gas, after entering the inner disk, is channelled by the magnetic field lines onto the magnetic poles of the neutron star, creating localised bright areas labelled "hot spot (bright in X-ray emission)." These regions emit intense X-rays due to the high-energy infall of material. The flow of gas toward the neutron star is labelled "infalling gas."
August 18, 2025 at 8:31 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
But other phenomena in the Universe can create the elements beyond iron, this periodic table gives an overview of this ✨
A color-coded periodic table showing the cosmic origins of each chemical element. Each element is shaded based on the primary astrophysical process responsible for its creation. There are six categories: Blue: Big Bang fusion (e.g., hydrogen, helium) Green: Dying low-mass stars (e.g., carbon, nitrogen) Yellow: Exploding massive stars (e.g., oxygen, silicon, calcium) Pink: Cosmic ray fission (e.g., lithium, beryllium, boron) Purple: Merging neutron stars (e.g., gold, platinum, uranium) Gray: Exploding white dwarfs (e.g., iron, nickel) Many heavy elements (particularly in the lanthanide and actinide series) are shown in purple, indicating they are produced in neutron star mergers. The periodic table highlights the diversity of cosmic events that create elements in the universe. Credit: Wikipedia / Cmglee / Jennifer Johnson (Ohio State University).
August 18, 2025 at 2:16 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
Hanging out with my Swinburne Uni pals tonight helping out with the outreach activities for #NationalScienceWeek ✨

And post these activities, we are all checking out this awesome panel as they talk about how they “decode the Universe” 😎

@ozgrav.bsky.social
A panel discussion is taking place in an auditorium. The audience is seated and watching the panelists, who are positioned at the front of the room. There are five people on stage seated in a semicircle, participating in the discussion. A large screen behind them displays information about the event, titled “National Science Week Panel: Decoding the Universe – Exploring the Unknown with Nature’s Hidden Language.” The screen features headshots and names of six panelists: Professor Virginia Kilborn, Dr. Sara Webb, Dr. Rebecca Allen, Dr. Kirsten Banks, Bailee Wolfe, and Sparrow Roch. Dr Sara Webb is not in attendance.
August 13, 2025 at 9:15 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
I’ll be chatting about some the cool science I get to do as part of the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA collaboration and with colleagues at OzGrav ✨

Happy National Science Week! 🧬🧪🔭

📆 August 15
⏰ 2-5 pm
📍The Chessboard next to the Melbourne Town Hall

@ligo.org @egovirgo.bsky.social @ozgrav.bsky.social
A picture of Dr. Shanika Galaudage, smiling, featured on a purple background with the text "Soapbox Science Melbourne." Below her photo, it says she is a postdoctoral researcher at Observatoire de la Côte d'Azur. A purple background with the question "Why do black holes 'chirp' when they collide?" and the name and title of Dr. Shanika Galaudage, a postdoctoral researcher at Observatoire de la Côte d'Azur.
August 10, 2025 at 12:15 PM
astronerdika.bsky.social
In Melbourne this Friday?

Me + others scientists will be on the streets chatting about our research at a @soapboxscience.bsky.social event! 😎

I’ll be talking about “Why do black holes ‘chirp’ when they collide?”

Here’s a lil preview (minus the props! 😂)

#NationalScienceWeek #WomenInSTEM
August 10, 2025 at 12:15 PM
astronerdika.bsky.social
I missed International Cat Day?! 😱

Shame on me.

So here, I give you, Pulsar Kitty.

It’s spinning pretty fast at ~700 times purr second. And it’s got some weird loopy magnetic field whiskers. And those beams of radiation from its eyes?! It’s a cosmic kitty lighthouse! ✨

#NeutronStars #Pulsars
A whimsical illustration of a pulsar depicted as a cat floating in space by @astronerdika. The cat is dark gray with glowing white eyes, and it appears semi-transparent with soft edges, giving it a rapidly spinning appearance. Two bright green beams of light emerge from its eyes pointing in opposite directions, representing the pulsar’s radiation beams. Curved cyan lines loop around the cat from where whiskers would emerge, symbolizing magnetic field lines. The background is a dark filled with small, glowing white dots representing distant stars.
August 8, 2025 at 3:12 PM
astronerdika.bsky.social
Heard the latest news from the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA collaboration? We detected the collision of the most massive pair of black holes so far: #GW231123 weighing in at ~137 + ~103 times the mass of the Sun!

So to celebrate, here’s a handy chart ✨

Just how chonky are these black holes? 🤔
An infographic titled "How BIG are the BLACK HOLES we find with GRAVITATIONAL WAVES?" by @astronerdika. The graphic displays a range of black hole masses detected via gravitational waves, categorized by their size in solar masses (mass of the Sun) and represented with playful cat-like black hole illustrations. The categories from left to right are: 1. "<5 times the mass of the Sun" - Labeled "smol" - Very small black hole illustration represented by a curled up black cat - Arrow pointing left: "THIS WAY TO NEUTRON STARS" - Example: "Big component of GW230529 (~3.6 times the mass of the Sun)" 2. "~10 times the mass of the Sun" - Labeled "basic" - Slightly larger black hole cat illustration - Caption: "LOTS OF BLACK HOLES" 3. "~35–45 times the mass of the Sun" - Labeled "hefty" - Bigger black hole cat illustration - Continues the idea of a populated range 4. ">60 times the mass of the Sun" - Labeled "chonky" - Large black hole cat illustration - Caption: "FORBIDDEN TERRITORY? (can these even be made from the collapse of star cores?!)" - Example: "Components of GW190521 (~85 + ~66 times the mass of the Sun)" 5. ">100 times the mass of the Sun" - Labeled "oh lawd" - Very large, curled-up black hole cat illustration - Arrow pointing right: "THIS WAY TO INTERMEDIATE MASS BLACK HOLES" - Example: "Components of GW231123 (~137 + ~103 times the mass of the Sun)" Below the categories is a stylized black curve representing the inferred population of black holes detected by LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA. It rises sharply in the "basic" range and falls off toward the "hefty" and "chonky" ranges, with a note reading: "this curve is an artistic representation of the black hole population inferred by LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA." This infographic draws from the “Chonky Cat” meme.
July 26, 2025 at 10:43 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
Was super excited my trip back home overlapped with @astrokatie.com’s visit to Melbourne (last time I saw a talk by her was when I was in undergrad!) Caught her lecture on ‘The End of Everything’ 😱

My favourite ending of the Universe?
Same as Katie’s: vacuum decay ✨

What’s yours? 🤨
Image of a darkened lecture hall with a projected slide highlighting some of the ways our Universe could meet its end. The darkness of the room definitely matched the vibe of this lecture. There are four theories highlighted: Big Crunch, Heat Death, Big Rip or Vacuum Decay. The last one mine and Dr Katie Mack’ favourite!
July 15, 2025 at 11:20 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
Checking out an amazing panel by these #SciComm giants in Melbourne (Dr Katie Mack, Rami Mandow, Dr Sara Webb, Dr Kirsten Banks and Prof Alan Duffy) ✨

Really cool to see how they got started in scicomm and their journey so far. I just know the folks in the audience are feeling so inspired 🤩
Image of a lecture room with 5 panel members siting in front of a huge projected screen. The panel is giving awesome information on science communication.
July 15, 2025 at 6:06 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
But this is just the tip of the iceberg. There are so many more black holes out there + many open questions.

Definitely an exciting time to be doing black hole related research 🤩
The title of this infographic reads “hide and seek, into the future” and there are three main points. 1. from theory to discovery, scientist across centuries have contributed to our understanding of these extreme objects. 2. but there is still a lot to uncover! Do primordial black holes exist? What really happens at the singularity? How do supermassive black holes grow so quickly? Information, is it preserved in a black hole? And more! 3. with further research and more space missions, we will continue to unravel the mysteries of these dark objects that are lurking in space-time…
May 11, 2025 at 1:50 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
And of course, black holes are Nobel prize winning theories and discoveries.
The title of this infographic is” and the Nobel prize goes to” with three main points 1. 2020 Nobel Prize and physics was awarded to scientist who made key contributions to black hole research. 2. Roger Penrose “for the discovery that black hole formation is a robust prediction of the general theory of relativity” 3. Reinhard Genzel and Andrea Ghez “for the discovery of a super massive compact object at the centre of our galaxy” there are small illustrations of space-time being stretched into a singularity and a black hole in front of very distant stars with the black hole warping the space around it.
May 11, 2025 at 1:50 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
Scientists snapped a photo of the supermassive black hole M87* with an Earth-sized telescope by linking radio dishes around the world!

@ehtelescope.bsky.social
The title of this infographic reads “now… say Cheese!” with one main point. 1. 2019. The first image of a black hole is taken using a network of radio telescopes. This black hole is a supermassive black hole at the centre of M 87, billions of times the mass of our Sun. In the centre of this infographic there is an illustration of the supermassive black hole photo which shows a dark region surrounded by a glowing yellow and red ring. There is an annotation to the dark patch saying “black hole shadow“
May 11, 2025 at 1:50 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
We can find the invisible when they interact with other things; star whirling around or OR when they collide into each other.

@ligo.org @egovirgo.bsky.social #GravitationalWaves
The title of this infographic reads “detecting the invisible“ and there are two main points 1. 2002 an orbit of a star confirms the existence of a supermassive black hole 4 million times the mass of our sun at the centre of the Milky Way. 2. 2015 scientist observed the gravitational wave signal from two black holes that collided around 1.3 billion light years away. In the top right of this info graphic there is an illustration of lots of little stars with a dark patch illustrating a black hole and there is a bright star orbiting this black hole. The black hole is labelled “Sagittarius A*” and the star is labelled “S2”. in the bottom left of this infographic there is an illustration of two black holes, colliding and omitting gravitational waves. This illustration is labelled as “GW150914”
May 11, 2025 at 1:50 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
Black holes are quite simple, they just have mass, spin and charge.

Also… black holes can get smaller?! But the catch here is that the black holes we've found will take MUCH longer than the age of the Universe to disappear from ‘evaporation’ 🤯

#BlackHoles #NoHair
this infographic has the title “simple and… Shrinkable?” there are three main points. 1. 1967-75 the “no hair” theorem states black holes can be described by only three parameters: mass, spin and charge. 2. 1972 Jacob Beckenstein hypothesis that black holes have entropy proportional to the area of their event horizon 3. 1974 Stephen Hawking added quantum theory to the mix to show that black holes emit radiation and evaporate next to the first point there is an illustration of a black hole that is spinning and that has positive charge.
May 11, 2025 at 1:50 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
The actual term “Black Hole” was made mainstream by John Wheeler. Much easier than saying “gravitationally completely collapsed object” 😂

And Cyg X-1 was the first black hole candidate! It’s eating away at its supergiant companion 😋

#BlackHoles #CygX1
The title of this infographic reads “the 1st candidate“ with two main points 1. 1967 - the term “black hole“ was popularised by John Wheeler in a lecture 2. 1971 - x-ray bright source discovered in a binary using a detector on a rocket! Found to be a black hole from mass measurements. in the centre of this infographic there is an illustration of a large blue star with matter accreting onto a black hole. The black hole has an accretion disc around it that is glowing orange and red and has jets flowing away from the black hole. The star is labelled as “blue supergiant“ and the black hole is labelled “Cygnus X-1“
May 11, 2025 at 1:50 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
Folks figured out that collapsing massive things could make black holes, and how singularities are inevitable occur in Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity.

#BlackHoles #Singularity
Infographic with two main titles connected by an arrow. The first says “gravity wins? Collapse!” along with two main points. 1. 1930-Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar calculated the upper limit mass limit for white dwarf; beyond which neutron stars in black holes conform 2. 1939 - J.Robert Oppenheimer and Hartland Snyder show massive stars could collapse into black holes. The second title on this info graphic reads “shaping the black hole” there is one item under this title . 1. 1958-63 - “Trapped surfaces” illustrated by Roger Penrose --- Roy Kerr finds a solution for a rotating black hole; more realistic ---Penrose singularity theorem.
May 11, 2025 at 1:50 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
Einstein comes along to shake things up! Gravity isn't a force, but rather something we experience due to the curvature in space-time 😮

#BlackHoles #GeneralRelativity
infographic with the title “the curvature of space time“ with two main points: 1. 1915 - Albert Einstein proposes a new perspective on gravity with his general theory of relativity 2. 1916 - Karl Schwartzchild finds a solution to Einstein‘s equations, describing a non-rotating black hole there is also a quote that reads “space-time tells matter how to move; matter tells space-time how to curve” this quote is by John Wheeler In the centre there is an illustration of curved space-time where a blue star is curving the grid of space-time. There are little clocks at varying distances from the star showing how much time is passing at each point illustrating the idea of time dilation.
May 11, 2025 at 1:50 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
And to think it began with an apple falling from a tree… (maybe)

But the idea of “dark stars” is so cool!

#Blackholes #Gravity
infographic with the title “gravity’s first mysteries” will three main points. 1. 1687 - Isaac Newton lays the groundwork for concepts of motion and gravity. 2. 1783 - “dark stars“ proposed by John Mitchell stars whose gravity can trap light. 3. 1796 - Pierre Simon Laplace suggest invisible stars whose escape velocity is greater than the speed of light. There is an illustration of an apple falling next to the first point. The last two points have an annotation to them that reads “uses Newtonian perspective of motion and gravity“
May 11, 2025 at 1:50 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
Yes I know… #BlackHoleWeek is over 😞 but that won't stop me from yapping about black holes! 😂

Here’s a set of infographics highlighting some of the key findings by scientists that helped us get to our understanding of black holes today! ✨

#Astrophysics #BlackHoles
The title card for a set of Infographics that says “the history of black holes: from theory to discovery” there is a illustration of distorted space time for a singularity.
May 11, 2025 at 1:50 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
Behold, some textured art! 🖼️

I shall temporarily rename this artwork for #BlackHoleWeek

“The screams from a dance of death”
Some textured art depicting to compact objects spiralling around and merging creating ripples. This is to illustrate gravitational waves. The art is lit only from the top to emphasise the shadows created by the texture. Otherwise there would be nothing to see in this artwork by Shanika.
May 7, 2025 at 9:32 AM
astronerdika.bsky.social
What is a #BlackHole? 🧐

They are some of the most extreme objects in the universe! 😎

Celebrate #BlackHoleWeek with me. And I have plenty of time to answer black hole questions while I wait for my manicure to dry 💅

📹 NASA/JPL-Caltech/R. Hurt (IPAC)
📹 NASA, ESA, K. Jackson (NASA-GSFC)
May 6, 2025 at 10:38 AM