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L. Kay (Barnard College, Columbia Univ.)
I have been using optical spectropolarimetry to investigate the nature of AGN. For the CAREER project, I have worked with A. M. Magalhães of the IAG in Brazil to use a visiting polarimetry module with the RC Spectrograph at CTIO, as well as conduct observations at Lick. Projects include observations of broad--line radio galaxies with double--peaked emission line profiles suggestive of accretion disks, and observations of a sample of X-ray selected narrow--line Seyfert~1 galaxies. Another project involves optical and X-ray observations of a complete sample of nearby Seyfert 2 galaxies in order to investigate the frequency of obscured broad--line regions and to determine their contribution to the X-ray background.
In addition to involving undergraduate students in research, my educational efforts have focused on getting science into our Women's Studies program. I teach a course on the history and sociology of women in science, co-teach a course on feminist science studies, helped to create a course on women's health, organized a faculty seminar on gender and science issues, and lead a project at Barnard on gender and scientific literacy.
I gratefully acknowledge support from NSF CAREER grant AST-9501835, as well as support from NSF International Research Fellowship INT-9423970, and from NSF grant EHR-9555808 to the AAC&U for the Gender and Scientific Literacy project.