Meet the Team

Becka Phillipson, PhD

Principal Investigator

Dr. Becka Phillipson is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Physics at Villanova University. Previously, she was an NSF MPS-Ascend postdoctoral fellow (2021-2024) and held an appointment at the University of Washington (2020-2022). She completed her PhD in Physics at Drexel University, where her graduate work was funded under a NASA Harrett G. Jenkins graduate research fellowship.

Dr. Phillipson is an astrophysicist who leverages statistics, nonlinear dynamics, and machine learning to study the explosive and highly variable characteristics of exotic astrophysical objects, such as black holes and neutron stars.

A list of publications can be found on the ADS website here.

Current Research Group Members

Samantha Spivack

Class of 2027, Statistics (Major), Astronomy (Minor), and French (Minor)

Villanova Undergraduate Research Fellow, Summer 2025

Villanova Match Program, Spring 2024

Current project: applying machine learning classification algorithms to distinguish recurrence plot features that vary with the accretion states of the black hole XRB, GRS 1915+105.

Recent publication: “Investigating the Changing Environment of a Black Hole” Veritas: Villanova Research Journal, Vol. 6 No. 1, 2024

Nathaniel Slichta

Class of 2028, Physics

Villanova Match Program, Spring 2025

Current project: developing a novel approach for sonifying recurrence plots, with a specific application to the various accretion states of GRS 1915+105.

Past Collaborators

Caleb de los Angeles (now PhD student at Drexel University)

Emily Broadbent (now PhD student at University of California, San Diego)