Yuki Okoda

Yuki Okoda is a Japanese astronomer. She made headlines while she was a physics graduate student in her 2nd year of Masters at the University of Tokyo's School of Science. Okoda found a dense disk of material around a young star, which may be a precursor of a planetary system. The star in question is known by its catalogue number IRAS 15398-3359.

Okoda and her colleagues are researching the formation of planetary systems through radio-wave observation using the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile. In 2018 Okoda was named one of the 100 influential women in the world by the BBC.

Publications

 * Yuki Okoda, Yoko Oya, Nami Sakai, Yoshimasa Watanabe, Jes K. Jørgensen, Ewine F. Van Dishoeck, and Satoshi Yamamoto. The Co-evolution of Disks and Stars in Embedded Stages: The Case of the Very-low-mass Protostar IRAS 15398-3359 - Astrophysical Journal Letters