Mike Hudson
Professor of Astrophysics & Cosmology
My research is in observational cosmology and galaxy formation and evolution. I measure the properties of dark matter and dark energy through gravitational lensing and cosmic flows, and I try to determine why galaxies make — and stop making — stars.
Research
Questions that drive the work
Large-scale structure and cosmic flows
How is matter — dark and luminous — distributed across the cosmos, and how fast is structure growing? Read more →
Galaxies and halos
How are galaxies related to the dark-matter halos in which they live, and how do they co-evolve? Read more →
Quenching of star formation in galaxies
Why do some galaxies keep forming stars while others quench, and how fast does it happen when they fall into a cluster? Read more →
Techniques
Three complementary probes
I attack these questions with three observational handles on dark matter and structure formation.
Gravitational lensing
Background galaxies appear subtly distorted by the mass — mostly dark matter — along the line of sight. By stacking the distortions of millions of galaxies we can map that mass directly. My group leads the weak-lensing analysis of the UNIONS survey and contributes to Euclid. Read more →
Large-scale structure and cosmic flows
Galaxies trace the dark-matter density field and move in response to it. Comparing observed peculiar velocities to predictions from galaxy redshift surveys is a direct, low-redshift probe of how fast structure is growing. Explore the interactive 3D model of superclusters in the nearby universe we built from the 2M++ catalogue. Read more →
Orbit libraries
When a galaxy falls into a group or cluster, its orbital history determines when and how it stops forming stars. We use N-body simulations to build a statistical map between observed phase-space coordinates and orbital histories, then fit simple models of stripping and quenching to large galaxy samples to measure when and how fast the quenching happens. Read more →
The Hudson group
Postdocs and graduate students at the Waterloo Centre for Astrophysics
L–R: Ariel Broderick, Martine Campbell, Mike Hudson, Darshak Patel, Pierre Burger, Ian Roberts, Amber Hollinger (July 2024)
Current group
Jack Elvin-Poole
Canadian Rubin Postdoctoral Fellow
Ian Roberts
Banting Postdoctoral Fellow
Jiapeng Zhang
Ph.D. candidate
Hardik Kuralkar
Ph.D. candidate
Joining the group
I welcome applications for graduate positions. Essential prerequisites are an undergraduate degree in physics/astronomy and experience with coding; undergraduate research (e.g. a senior honours thesis) is a bonus. Undergrads should consult the Department's page on Undergraduate Research Awards.
Alumni
Selected former students and postdocs (* = co-supervised).
| Name | Degree / Position | Year | Current position |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pierre Burger | Postdoc | 2025 | Machine Learning Scientist at SOVRA |
| Hunter Martin | Ph.D. | 2025 | Postdoc at U Cincinnati |
| Martine Campbell | M.Sc. | 2025 | Ph.D. candidate, Barcelona |
| Darshak Patel | M.Sc. | 2025 | — |
| Amber Hollinger | Ph.D. | 2024 | Postdoc at Australian National University |
| Jordan Ducatel | M.Sc.* | 2024 | Product Information Analyst at Grainger |
| Andrew Reeves | Ph.D. | 2023 | Postdoc at York University |
| Isaac Spitzer | Ph.D. | 2022 | Software Engineer at STScI |
| Supranta Boruah | Ph.D.* | 2020 | Postdoc at U. Penn |
| Kyle Oman | M.Sc. | 2013 | Faculty, Durham University |
| Laura Parker | Ph.D. | 2005 | Faculty, McMaster University |
| …plus many more — view the full alumni list → | |||
News & highlights
Recent press coverage
First "image" of a dark-matter web connecting galaxies
Astrophysicists Mike Hudson and Seth Epps captured the first composite image of a dark-matter bridge connecting galaxies. Read the paper.
3D master map of the universe
A spherical map of galaxy superclusters spanning nearly two billion light-years — the most complete picture of our cosmic neighbourhood to date.
Related research
Institutes, surveys and missions