
After seeing Jupiter and Saturn through a telescope and watching and reading everything space I could as a kid, astronomy has been what I wanted to do. However, astronomy and astrophysics were put on hold for the more practical concerns of getting a job.
I had a career of nearly twenty years in IT, mostly as a network engineer, and I obtained a Masters by research part time. In 2014 I had the opportunity to pursue my PhD full time studying stellar magnetic fields. After my PhD I spent 18 months as a Research Fellow in computational astrophysics at UniSQ where I also helped with the planning and initial building of the MINERVA Australis facility.
I am now a Lecturer in Computing at UniSQ, but my main research interests are still in astrophysics and stellar magnetism, but I am also keen to help create multi-disciplinary collaborations between astronomy and IT, computer science and engineering.
Currently, my projects are on hold while I am establishing my teaching, but I am involved in various collaborations
- Stellar Magnetic Fields
- Stellar Dynamos
- Stellar Evolution
- Exoplanets
Dr Mengel’s publications can be viewed here