The groundbreaking discoveries of gravitational waves from binary black-hole mergers and, more recently, coalescing neutron stars started a new era of Gravitational-Wave Astrophysics and revolutionized our understanding of the Cosmos. Deep learning algorithms, such as artificial neural networks, are already transforming many scientific and technological fields, and have also proven successful in gravitational-wave astrophysics for detection and parameter estimation of gravitational-wave signals from binary black holes. In...

Physical processes that redistribute or remove angular momentum from protoplanetary disks can drive mass accretion onto the star and affect the outcome of planet formation. Despite ubiquitous evidence for accretion, the process(es) responsible remain a mystery. I will describe how measurements of disk sizes and IR spectroscopy of nearly edge-on disks may shed new light on this long-standing problem, in the latter case by directly probing disk accretion in action! The results may provide evidence for...

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"Star cluster formation and feedback: a close view from the local universe"

Abstract: In spite of the huge observational and numerical progresses made, young star clusters remain, de facto, a challenge to study. Potentially they are considered key tracers of star formation conditions, as well as units of stellar feedback within their host galaxies.  They sit at the intermediate scales of the star formation cycle of galaxies and can therefore unlock the intricate regulator interplay between star formation and feedback that drives to galaxy...