Kerri Cahoy

Key takeaways

Kerri Cahoy belongs to engineering; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Kerri Cahoy to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Kerri Cahoy from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Professor Kerri L. Cahoy is an electrical and aerospace engineer and a professor of Aeronautics and Astronautics at MIT. She is also the co-founder of laser communications firm SpaceRake. Cahoy is the leader of the Space Telecommunications, Astronomy and Radiation Laboratory (STAR) at MIT, and she is most well known for her research in studying planetary atmospheres and exoplanet atmospheres along with her technology demonstration work on nanosatellites.

Early life and family Cahoy's parents are Joseph Jay and Barbara Kusza of Wallingford, CT. She attended Choate Rosemary Hall in Wallingford for high school and graduated in 1996. Her father was an electrician, which she cites is one of the things that inspired her to study electrical engineering. She stated in an interview that she chose to go into electrical engineering because she loved the way it challenged her and enjoyed reading and writing. As she now works in the field of aeronautics and astronautics, she has stated how she enjoys studying the applications of electrical engineering in helping to further explore the Earth and beyond.

Education and career Cahoy attended Cornell University for her Bachelor of Science in electrical engineering and graduated in 2000. She then attended Stanford University for her Master of Science (2002) and Ph.D. (2008) both in electrical engineering. At Stanford, she served as a graduate research assistant for several courses in the Department of Electrical Engineering. Additionally, it was there that Cahoy continued combining her passions for electrical engineering and aerospace as she studied how we could learn more about weather on planets beyond Earth using instrumentation like satellite radio signals. Her dissertation was entitled Characterization of thermal tides at ionospheric altitudes on Mars with Mars Global Surveyor Radio Occultation measurements of electron density and her principal adviser was emeritus Professor G. Leonard Tyler. From 2006 to 2008, she served as a Senior Communication Sciences Specialist and Senior Engineering Specialist at Space Systems Loral. After finishing her Ph.D., she served as a NASA Postdoctoral Program Fellow in Moffet Field, California where she focused on studying exoplanets through direct imaging of exoplanets and modeling exoplanet atmospheres. Cahoy started her career at MIT in June 2010 on the research staff in Earth and Planetary Sciences affiliated with the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. In July 2011, she became an assistant professor of Aeronautics and Astronautics. At that time, she also became the director of the MIT Space Telecommunications, Astronomy and Radiation Laboratory (STAR). In July 2016, she became an associate professor of Aeronautics and Astronautics, and in July 2023, she became a full Professor of Aeronautics and Astronautics. In November 2023, she was titled the Associate Department Head. She is also a faculty member in the Space Systems Laboratory at MIT and a co-director of the Small Satellite Collaborative at MIT.

Research and work Research and STAR Laboratory Cahoy's research has investigated heavily in technology demonstrations with nanosatellites, or CubeSat platforms. She directs the STAR lab at MIT which is focused on four key areas: weather sensing, connectivity, exoplanet detection and characterization, and nanosatellite technology. Her work aims to get groups, or "constellations" of the small satellites to work together to gather data to inform research on the applications mentioned. One of these CubeSat platforms called DeMi was launched from Wallops Island, Virginia in February 2020. On this CubeSat is a deformable mirror that can help in detecting exoplanets and picturing distant stars. Cahoy and her students will continue to study the data from DeMi in the coming years. One element of her research is to develop and enhance laser communication terminals and ground stations so that the groups of satellites can have crosslink communications. This enables the satellites to have joint observations. Cahoy currently serves as the Principal Investigator for multiple NASA missions related to laser communication including "Miniature Optical Steered Antenna for Intersatellite Communication" (MOSAIC) and "CubeSat Laser Infrared CrosslinK" (CLICK). Cahoy's research is also influential in the field of exoplanet detection and characterization especially in the realm of imaging and detecting exoplanets. Her lab has contributed to missions including NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) and Laser Guide Star for Large Aperture Segmented Space Telescopes (LGS). Her research also contributes to the field of weather sensing in which she studies how CubeSats (or small satellites) with instrumentation for weather sensing "can passively make precise measurements of atmospheric temperature at different altitudes". Her team has flown 3 CubeSats so far, and the success has proven that these smaller scale satellites can oftentimes provide comparable data to that of larger instruments or spacecraft. In October 2019, Cahoy gave a TED Talk called "How Tiny Satellites Can Help Us Weather Through Hurricanes". She discussed how large satellites that collect data for weather forecasting can leave large gaps of data in areas that happen to be most affected by hurricanes. To fix this problem, there needs to be more satellites which are not only costly but can take a while to build. Not only can the smaller CubeSats help fill in the gap of this data, but also they are less costly. Notable Publication Cahoy's most cited work is Thermal emission and reflected light spectra of super Earths with flat transmission spectra published in 2015 in The Astrophysics Journal. The work studies "Super Earths" and models to predict "their transmission, thermal emission and reflected light spectra." The work currently has over 230 citations. SpaceRake Cahoy is also a co-founder of SpaceRake, which specializes in laser communication technologies. The company is currently working on three main endeavors: (1) Cubesat-Compatible Terminal, Human-Portable Lasercom Ground Terminal, and Multi-Access Router Architecture. In November 2023, SpaceRake was awarded their first government contract. It awarded them $1.8 million for the purposes of developing "miniature laser communications terminals."

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Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Kerri Cahoy

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Kerri Cahoy claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In engineering, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Kerri Cahoy before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Kerri Cahoy ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Kerri Cahoy

In research: Kerri Cahoy appears in engineering research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Kerri Cahoy in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Kerri Cahoy is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics American aerospace engineers, Cornell University alumni, Living people, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Kerri Cahoy outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

How to study Kerri Cahoy in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Kerri Cahoy means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Kerri Cahoy out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Kerri Cahoy in simple terms?

Professor Kerri L. Cahoy is an electrical and aerospace engineer and a professor of Aeronautics and Astronautics at MIT.

Why does Kerri Cahoy matter?

Because it connects several engineering ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Kerri Cahoy?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Kerri Cahoy.