Astrophysicist · massive star formation & high-angular-resolution observations
Postdoctoral researcher, I. Physics Institute, University of Cologne
I study how the most massive stars assemble their mass and acquire their companions, using infrared interferometry (VLTI GRAVITY/MATISSE), adaptive optics and ALMA, from the Galactic Centre to the Magellanic Clouds.
I grew up on La Réunion, a tiny island in the Indian Ocean, and lived there until I was 18. Then came the sot la mèr, literally “jump the ocean”, as we say in Creole, to pursue my studies in mainland France. It was a big leap in more ways than one: I had to find my own path as a young scientist and as a woman in science.
My curiosity about the Universe started with one big question: are we alone? Astronomy seemed like the obvious way to investigate. One thing I had not realised back then? The night sky looks different depending on which hemisphere you are in. Turns out, even the stars have a change of scenery!
Since then, my journey has taken me across Belgium, Germany, Hawaii, Taiwan and Chile, with plenty of extra stamps from conferences along the way. I completed a joint PhD between KU Leuven and ESO in Santiago. My thesis, On the Origin of Massive Close Binaries, explored how massive multiple-star systems form. I am now a postdoc at the University of Cologne.
One of my favourite places in the world is an observatory. There is something magical about going there, standing at the edge of the unknown, and getting ready to discover something we have never seen before. I suppose I am a bit like a mad scientist heading into the lab to run an experiment, except my laboratory is a mountaintop, my experiments involve starlight, and sometimes the Universe and the clouds have other plans for the night!
When I am not studying the stars, I like getting a little closer to the sky the old-fashioned way: climbing and hiking in the mountains. I also love cycling and canyoning. Whenever I can, I return to La Réunion to tackle my favourite trails all over again. Same island, same paths, same enthusiasm. Apparently, I never get tired of a good view!
I also enjoy experimenting in the kitchen. I bake my own bread with the help of an ever-alive sourdough blob, and I love making cakes to celebrate my friends, who happily serve as my beta testers.
I also try to recreate a little tropical-jungle vibe in my German apartment, surrounding myself with plants as a way to compensate for the lack of sunshine (and vitamin D!).
Massive stars are among the most powerful objects in the Universe, shaping their surroundings and influencing how galaxies evolve. But how do these stellar giants form? And why do so many have companions?
I study the birth of massive stars and their stellar companions, following the journey from vast clouds of gas and dust down to the regions where stars take shape. Using some of the world’s most powerful telescopes, I zoom in on these stellar nurseries to investigate how material feeds growing stars and how pairs or groups of stars form together.
Using high-angular-resolution techniques such as VLTI interferometry, I look for close companions to massive stars. I study how these systems are built: binaries, and triples or higher-order systems.
Slightly wider companions (10²–10⁴ au) around massive stars that are still accreting tell us how multiple systems form in the first place, before migration and dynamics erase that information.
I probe the infrared environment of massive stars in unusual places, such as the Galactic Centre. There I lead the first VLTI/MATISSE study of IRS 13E, using radiative-transfer modelling of the interferometric data.
Bordier et al., in prep.
Three steps back in time: from hierarchical triples on the main sequence, to ~1 Myr-old O stars, to stars that are still accreting.
A census of hierarchical triples among massive stars from the SMaSH+ interferometric survey. Their architecture carries clues about how the systems formed and evolved.
NACO L′-band imaging of massive young stellar objects shows that companions at 10²–10⁴ au are already present while the central star is still accreting.
GRAVITY observations of ~1 Myr-old O stars in M17 reveal au-scale companions. The results support the idea that companions form wide and migrate inward.
I am also co-author on work about Betelgeuse’s candidate companion (Montargès et al. 2026), a binary in the S cluster near Sgr A* (Peißker et al. 2024, Nat. Commun.), Wolf-Rayet binaries (Deshmukh et al. 2024) and HR 6819 (Frost et al. 2022). Full list on ADS →
Facilities and instruments I use: VLTI (GRAVITY, GRAVITY+, MATISSE, PIONIER) · VLT (VISIR, NACO, SPHERE) · ALMA · and soon ELT/METIS.
“To be like you.”A six-year-old girl who came to my workshops every day of an astronomy festival, when I asked what she wanted to be when she grows up. Those words will always resonate with me, and remind me that I chose the right path.