When Coleman Dean first arrived at the University of Alberta as an undergraduate, he wasn't entirely sure what he wanted to study. He had a list of contenders and considered medicine and engineering, but ultimately, astrophysics emerged as the clear choice.
"Astrophysics was a field where I felt I would be learning really interesting data analysis skills while also pursuing a passion on top of that," says Dean, who is graduating this week with his PhD in physics.
Dean says he's been fascinated by space since he was a child taking trips to the observatory with his Scouts group to learn about the planets and stars. That interest was further fuelled by his long-standing love of science fiction — in his spare time, Dean makes movie replica props, 3D printing components and carefully painting them until the final result looks like it's been transported from another galaxy.
And though his creations come from fictional worlds, his research seeks answers to real-life space phenomena that have yet to be explained.
His master's thesis focused on how heavy elements such as gold and uranium can be produced when binary neutron stars collide under particular conditions. Under the supervision of Rodrigo Fernández, Dean created simulations designed to model extreme astrophysical events.
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"This approach tries to predict what we might see in these types of events rather than observing it with a telescope," he explains. "It was something that took advantage of the data analysis skill set I built up during my bachelor's and it was an interesting way of looking at astrophysics.
"I enjoyed solving problems that way — numerically, writing code to transform data and find a solution to a problem that is maybe too complex to be able to do with pen and paper."
For his doctoral research, Dean continued examining environments in which heavy metals are produced in space, using hydrodynamic modelling to study a type of supernova that explodes in an unusual way.
"We have an idea of what the progenitor star is and how the mechanism works for the way the explosion happens, but we still don't really understand the details," he says. "My PhD research involved looking at these explosions, modelling them to see how they act in the core, how the energy is injected into the star and whether this explosion could eventually lead to the production of these heavy elements."
In addition to publishing research papers about his work, Dean creates colourful data visualizations that bring his findings to life on screen. They also add another layer of information, offering insight into how the explosions unfold. "We're tracking where a shock wave is going — Is it oscillating back and forth? Is it expanding out symmetrically?"
He was awarded an Alberta Graduate Excellence Scholarship as well as funding from NSERC to support his research.
Throughout his graduate studies, Dean has also worked as a teaching assistant, mainly for undergraduate physics labs — something he was inspired to do because of the impact a TA in his first year had on him.
"It's nice to be able to have an impact on the students coming into the programs here," says Dean, who became a head teaching assistant in 2023 and also received a Graduate Student Teaching Award in May 2024.
"I try to provide a fresh perspective on the material they covered in class. Hopefully seeing the same material taught from a few different angles will reinforce what they're learning and make it easier for them to remember and problem solve with the topics."
A desire to solve problems is what drives Dean, and it is a skill he has sought to build ever since admiring it in his father growing up.
"We'd be doing a carpentry project or something like that, and I just wouldn't be sure how to approach a problem — and I felt like my dad was always able to figure out how we could achieve a particular goal."
An exploratory attitude and endless curiosity — not surprising from someone who was also a huge Mythbusters fan as a child — served him throughout his studies.
