Rate My Professor Benjamin Pope

Benjamin Pope is an Associate Professor in Statistical Data Science at Macquarie University, leading the Astrostatistics Research Group in the School of Mathematical and Physical Sciences. He earned his DPhil in Astrophysics from the University of Oxford in 2017, supported by Clarendon and Jowett Scholarships, an MSc in Astrophysics from the University of Sydney in 2013 with the Vice-Chancellor’s Research Award, and a BSc (Advanced Honours) in Physics from the University of Sydney in 2012, where he received the University Medal, Dean’s Honours List recognition, prizes for best physics and astrophysics theses, and the national Bok Prize for best astrophysics honours thesis. His career includes Senior Lecturer in Astrophysics and ARC Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA) Fellow at the University of Queensland from 2021 to 2024, NASA Sagan Postdoctoral Fellow at New York University’s Center for Data Science and Center for Cosmology and Particle Physics from 2017 to 2020, and Breakthrough Foundation Postdoctoral Research Associate at the University of Sydney in 2017. Affiliated with the Astrophysics and Space Technologies Research Centre and Data Horizons Research Centre, Pope teaches units such as Bayesian Data Analysis and Data Science.

Pope specializes in extrasolar planets, developing statistical data science methods for their detection and characterization, including radio astronomy for star-planet magnetic interactions, differentiable physical optics models for exoplanet direct imaging hardware design and analysis via the dLux library, and surveys of naked-eye stars in Kepler, K2, and TESS for transiting planets and pulsating stars. He has secured ARC Discovery Projects, including “Where are all the exo-Earths?” ($592,045, 2025) and ARC DP26, as well as Macquarie University Lighthouse Fellowships. Awards include the Queensland Tall Poppy Award (2022), ARC DECRA Fellowship, and Big Questions Institute Fellowship. Key publications feature “Radio signatures of star–planet interactions, exoplanets and space weather” (Nature Astronomy, 2024), “Quantum-enabled optical large-baseline interferometry: applications, protocols and feasibility” (Advances in Physics: X, 2026), “Catching the wisps: Stellar mass-loss limits from low-frequency radio observations” (Astronomy & Astrophysics, 2025), “A General, differentiable transit model for ellipsoidal occulters” (Astrophysical Journal, 2025), and JWST-related works on Y dwarfs photometry and image reconstruction. With 69 research outputs, including contributions to Nature and Astrophysical Journal, his scholarship impacts astrostatistics and exoplanet science.