Dados Pessoais (Personal Info)
My full name is Carlos Alexandre Wuensche de Souza, I was born in Rio de Janeiro. I live in São José dos Campos since 1985, after my graduation in Physics, at the Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (UERJ), in 1984.
My MSc was taken in Astrogeophysics (1988), in High Energy Astrophysics, under the supervision of Dr. Udaya Baskharam Jayanthi. The title of my dissertation is "Observations of SN 1987A in X- and gamma rays" (Observações da SN 1987A na faixa de raios X e gama).
My PhD programa was in Experimental Cosmology (1995), studying the Cosmic Microwave Background anisotropies, under the supervision of Dr. Thyrso Villela, while in Brazil. The title of my thesis is "Contributions to the study of the Cosmic Microwave Background" (Contribuições ao estudo da Radiação Cósmica de Fundo).
I worked at University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) from 1991 to 1994, and during the Polar Summer 1994, at the Amundsen-Scott Polar Station, at the South Pole. Below you can see the caterpillar used to drive us from the main dome to the lab. This picture was taken after 48 hours awake, dismantling the lab to return to the United States.
This is the aerial picture of the Amundsen-Scott station.
Presently I am a scientist at the Divisão de Astrofísica (Astrophysics Division) at INPE. My group is involved in three main instrumental projects:
The GEM (Galaxy Emission Mapping) project, to map the synchrotron emission from our Galaxy, in a joint collaboration with University of California, Berkeley;
The COFE (Cosmic Foreground Explorer), to study the CMB polarization and the Galactic foregrounds that disturb CMB polarization measurements, in a cooperation with UCSB;
The ARCADE (Absolute Radiometer for Cosmology, Astrophysics, and Diffuse Emission) project, to measure CMB spectrum, in a larger international cooperation.
I also have another interests related to CMB phenomena, and lately have put some time into the fascinating field of Astrobiology.
My hobbies and other stuff can be found in the parallel CV.