Scientist Spotlight: Tyler Trent

Sept. 21, 2022
By Scott Coleman, College of Science
Tyler Trent

Tyler Trent is a graduate student in the College of Science pursuing a PhD in Physics with a minor in Astronomy. A native of Oahu, Hawaii, Tyler is a promising young astrophysicist who has collaborated with world-renowned scholars during his time at the University of Arizona, including work on the Event Horizon Telescope's 2019 publications of the first ever image of a black hole.

Tyler was nominated for the College of Science's Scientist Spotlight series as an outstanding and valued member of our community. The College caught up with Tyler to discuss his journey to UArizona, his contributions to the Event Horizon Telescope, and more.

Tyler Trent

Hometown: Oahu, Hawaii
Areas of Study: Astrophysics, PhD Thesis is on Black Holes
Degrees obtained and/or in progress: Bachelors of Science in Physics and Math from University of Hawaii; Masters in Physics from University of Arizona; PhD in Physics with a minor in Astronomy (in progress).
 
College of Science: Tell us about your path to the University of Arizona and your current role in the Physics Department.
 
Tyler: When I was a senior in undergrad I knew I wanted to continue my physics education by going to grad school. However, getting into grad school was very competitive. At the time I was at the University of Hawaii, which is not an ivy league school, my grades were average, my physics GRE score was average so I knew my application for getting into a grad school wouldn't be the most competitive. I even had professors telling me I would be lucky to get into any graduate school. I figured if I had a low probability of getting into any one grad school, I would just apply to as many as I could. I ended up applying to 30 grad schools. Literally spent every dollar I had in savings and went into a little debt on my credit card paying for it all. University of Arizona was actually the last school on my list that I applied to.
 
I ended up getting into a handful of schools to my surprise, and everyone else's surprise. Since I was interested in computational methods of doing science I was intrigued in working with Prof. Feryal Ozel, who I heard did black hole simulations. After meeting with her via zoom, she seemed nice. So it seemed like a good fit and I came to University of Arizona to work with her and Prof. Dimitrios Psaltis.
 
CoS: Growing up, what drew you to Astrophysics and your current interests in space exploration?
 
Tyler: Growing up I wanted to be an astronaut. I thought it was the perfect balance of cool superhero and smart brainiac. Like you're flying a rocket to space which is awesome but you're also doing science. I tried my best in every class as a kid in order to set myself up to be an astronaut. Then in my freshman year of highschool I went to this science fair where a real astronaut gave a talk and he said NASA was shutting down the astronaut program and essentially told all the young students there that there would be no astronauts and to give up on that dream. And I did. My grades fell and I stopped trying. I barely graduated highschool. To be fair, there were other things going on in my life that also played a role in my underachieving in highschool but this was a huge part of it.
 
After highschool I went to community college where I decided I wanted to do good in the world. After much meditation on how to do good I chose that I wanted to contribute to the world in science, and I saw physics to be the most fundamental science. Thus, I decided I would become a physicist and contribute to the world by adding to the knowledge of physics. At first particle physics really excited me. To understand the building blocks of everything. However, it seemed as if particle physics was trending down in terms of funding and opportunities for new scientists. Astrophysics on the other hand was really gaining momentum and every year was receiving more in funding. So when it came time to decide on which graduate school to attend, after meeting Prof. Feryal Ozel, I decided to do astrophysics.
 
CoS: What is your proudest career or academic achievement to date?
 
Tyler: So I can't say I have any proud achievement yet. I'm working on my first first-author paper which will definitely be my proudest achievement! But that's not done yet... I think the next closest thing that I would say I'm somewhat proud of is the contributions I made to the Event Horizon Telescope's 2019 publications of the first ever image of a black hole. At the time I had only been working on the project for ~6 months so my contribution is miniscule compared to the people who had been working in this collaboration for over a decade.
 
Essentially the small project I did was taking the images of the black holes that were generated (which there were thousands of) and using a program I wrote, characterize the black holes of the images by measuring its size and width. Even though you only see one photo of the black hole in the media, the collaboration actually produced thousands of photos of the black hole that match the data. I would then take these photos and run a program I made on to get the size and width of the black holes in the photos. The size was then used to determine the mass of the black hole which was important because at the time there was two other mass measurements of this particular black hole, that were in disagreement, and our third measurement agreed with one of the previous measurements. I guess for me, just being able to feel like I contributed and my work made it to the paper published, even though it was such a small part of the entire project, made me feel a little happy/proud.
 
CoS: What are some of your favorite aspects of being at the University of Arizona?
 
Tyler: I really enjoy the weather, the University facilities like the library is really nice, the gym is nice and has a ton of equipment. Besides those things, I really found a home in the Astronomy Department. They have an amazing community there where I really feel supported. The other graduate students there have been welcoming and friendly. Professors besides my main PhD advisors have given me mentorship and helped guide me. Post-docs there have helped me with my research. They have their own library which is also really nice. Also, the research that I am doing on black holes I wouldn't be able to do just anywhere. The University of Arizona has the computing resources I need run my simulations. Also, my advisors and the whole research group they have formed have the expertise to guide me.
 
CoS: Outside of your research, what are some of your favorite hobbies or activities?
 
Tyler: So my absolute favorite thing to do in the world is bodysurf. It's a form of surfing where you don't use a surfboard and you just use your body to create a planing surface on the wave. I do regular surfing with a surfboard, I also bodyboard, and do canoe surfing. Honestly I enjoy any type of surfing. There's no wrong way to ride a wave. But even if there aren't any waves, just getting into the ocean has always been a calming and curing activity for me. So in Hawaii, where I'm from, I just enjoy the ocean.
 
Now here in Arizona, where there is no ocean, I had to find a new hobby. Surprisingly, I actually ended up getting into video gaming. Before coming to Arizona I almost never played video games. But now I look forward to the weekends when I can play games with friends for hours and hours. I particularly like competitive shooter games like Overwatch. Overwatch is a team shooter game where two teams compete against each other to capture an objective. I really enjoy the teamwork that this game necessitates. I get a real sense of comradery when my team and I are trying to execute a certain strategy against the enemy team and it's a super high stress situation and everything is happening extremely fast. The comradery is really my favorite part about it and I've actually made quite a bit of friends gaming and even started my own twitch channel where I stream my gameplay, twitch.tv/tylarger.
 
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