Oegerle's PhD thesis was on theoretical modeling of stellar winds. However, he was soon lured to observational astronomy at Kitt Peak National Observatory, where he spent the last couple of years of graduate school. His first postdoctoral position was at Princeton University, working on the Copernicus mission (a space telescope with ultraviolet spectrometers for studying the interstellar medium). In 1982, he joined the Space Telescope Science Institute as an assistant astronomer working on the Science operations ground system for the HST. In 1994, he became Deputy Project Scientist and Chief of Science Operations for the Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic Explorer (FUSE) at Johns Hopkins University. After the successful development, launch and science operations of FUSE, he joined NASA/GSFC in December 2000 as Head of the UV/Optical Astronomy Branch. He was subsequently appointed Chief of the Laboratory for Astronomy and Solar Physics in 2003 and Director of the Astrophysics Science Division in 2008.
Research
Primary scientific interests include the formation, dynamics and evolution of clusters of galaxies, large scale structure in the universe, and the physics of the interstellar and intergalactic medium and their relation to galaxy evolution.
Projects
Member of The Advanced Dark Energy Physics Telescope (ADEPT), which is a concept for the Joint Dark Energy Mission (Bennett, PI). This concept characterizes dark energy by using the Baryon Acoustic Oscillation technique, and through observing Type Ia Supernovae.
Education
B.S., Physics, University of Florida, 1972
Ph.D., Astrophysics, University of Massachusetts, 1977
