Florida Tech Ph.D. student Lauren Hoffman has been awarded a prestigious NASA Future Investigators in NASA Earth and Space Science and Technology (FINESST) research grant to support her research on the Milky Way’s luminous stellar makeup and refining how distance is measured in outer space. The grant, one of the most competitive graduate research awards offered by the agency, is awarded to just 5% of applicants annually.
Hoffman’s research proposal was one of just 24 selected from the 456 submitted to NASA’s Astrophysics Division for 2025 awards.
The division gives student recipients, whom it labels “Future Investigators,” $150,000 in grant funding over three years to support research, educational development and outreach efforts to engage the public with astronomy.
Hoffman’s project, “Investigating the Period‑Luminosity Relation of Long-Period Variable Stars in the Local Milky Way,” is supervised by principal investigator Luis Quiroga-Nuñez, Ph.D,, an assistant professor of space sciences, director of the Ortega Observatory and her Ph.D. advisor. The two researchers hope to build a better understanding of long-period variable stars – stars that regularly change in brightness – for their community of astronomers.
Hoffman remembers the moment Quiroga-Nuñez called her with news of her selection: She was speechless, then cried tears of joy.
“I never, in a hundred million years, expected to get this research grant. I almost can’t even describe how excited I was,” Hoffman said. “It’s such an honor, and I’m so incredibly ecstatic to get the opportunity to do this research.”
Quiroga-Nuñez is just as proud to support Hoffman’s success. She is his first student to be selected for FINESST – a testament to both her scientific excellence and the strength of the university’s physics and space sciences Ph.D. programs, he said.
“This award reflects Lauren’s exceptional promise as a scientist and underscores the caliber of research being done at Florida Tech,” Quiroga-Nuñez said. “Watching her grow into a confident and capable scientist has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my career.”
Hoffman will analyze long-period variable stars within about 10,000 light-years of the Sun. She’ll use data from facilities and missions such as Gaia, the European Space Agency’s billion-star surveyor; Zwicky Transient Facility, the California-based facility that conducts full surveys of the Northern sky every two days; and the National Radio Astronomy Observatory’s Very Large Array telescope in New Mexico. Her project will also explore how differences in star chemistry affect the period-luminosity relation.
Astronomers use variable stars for as a guide to cosmic distance and stellar evolution by utilizing a measurement called the period-luminosity relation. The formula uses the correlation between a star’s intrinsic luminosity to the time its light takes to pulsate to estimate distance.
Hoffman hopes her findings will help refine the measurement when used within the Milky Way to better map the galaxy’s stellar environment. They may also offer new insights into the Milky Way’s formation and evolution, complementing major NASA missions such as the James Webb Space Telescope and the upcoming Roman Space Telescope.
“It’s such a privilege and an honor to be able to do this research…to be someone who helps to look at the stars and figure out what’s going on out there,” Hoffman said. “I’m so proud to help further the scientific community in astronomy and astrophysics.”
