Dan Coe, PhD

Dr. Dan Coe is an astronomer at the Space Telescope Science Institute and provides support for astronomers using and preparing to use the Hubble Space Telescope and the James Webb Space Telescope. As an instrument scientist for the JWST Near Infrared Camera (NIRCam), Dr. Coe wrote much of that instrument’s user manual in JDox (JWST Documentation) and developed more efficient dither patterns for NIRCam observations. He is also the Frontier Fields Lens Model coordinator. As an astronomer, Dr. Coe discovers and studies the most distant galaxies known using the Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescopes with the aid of gravitational lensing by massive galaxy clusters. He is the principal investigator of the Reionization Lensing Cluster Survey (RELICS), a 188-orbit Hubble Treasury Program. RELICS observed 41 clusters and delivered many of the best and brightest galaxies known in the universe’s first billion years (z ~ 6 – 10). Previously, as a co-investigator on the Hubble Multi-Cycle Treasury Program CLASH (Cluster Lensing And Supernova survey with Hubble), Dr. Coe discovered a strong candidate for the most distant galaxy known at z ~ 11. Dr. Coe also successfully advocated for lensing clusters to be included in the Hubble Deep Fields Initiative, which became the Frontier Fields.