Near field cosmology in and around the Local Group

像我们的银河系这样的星系是如何形成和演化的，这是现代天文学中一个悬而未决的主要问题。在过去的十年里，天文学上的几个不同的研究方向已经聚集在一起，把重点放在对银河系及其近邻的研究上，这些目标在天文学上是独一无二的，因为我们有能力分辨照亮这些星系的单个恒星。在观测方面，我们在银河系周围发现了大量新的、非常小的星系，它们显然受到了像我们这样的大星系如此接近的影响。在理论方面，很明显，我们的宇宙演化模型——当我们观察最大的宇宙尺度时，它非常有效——很难解释这些小星系的特性。在技术方面，正在开发的新仪器将使我们能够在更远的距离上解剖星系的性质——无论大小——通过解析每一颗单独的恒星，以前所未有的精度。我提出的研究计划是在这些研究线的交汇处，并将研究这些小星系的特性是如何随着我们远离银河系而变化的，当我们到达这些小星系在其整个历史中能够和平进化的区域时。天文学家在解释小星系的样子时遇到的困难是由于我们的星系形成模型完全错误，还是因为我们所研究的星系被银河系抨击得太多，不能作为我们比较模型的好例子？在探索这些问题的过程中，我的研究项目将使用一些最新的仪器，不仅可以回答这些关键的科学问题，还可以了解如何更好地开发最适合这门科学的基础技术。

How galaxies like our own Milky Way form and evolve is a major unanswered question in modern astronomy. Over the last decade, several distinct lines of enquiry in astronomy have converged to place significant focus on the study of the Milky Way and its nearest neighbours, targets that are unique in astronomy due to our ability to resolve the individual stars that light these galaxies up. On the observational side, we have discovered a huge number of new, very small, galaxies that surround the Milky Way and which have clearly been affected by being so close to a large galaxy like ours. On the theory side, it has become evident that our model of the evolution of the Universe - that works remarkably well when we look on the largest cosmic scales - struggles to explain the properties of these small galaxies. On technology fronts, new instruments are being developed that will allow us to dissect the properties of galaxies - large and small - at ever greater distances and with unprecedented accuracy by resolving each of their individual stars. My proposed research program is placed at the interface of these lines of enquiry, and will examine how the properties of these small galaxies change as we get further away from the Milky Way, to regions where these small systems have been able to evolve peacefully over their entire history. Is the difficulty that astronomers have in explaining what small galaxies look like a result of our model of galaxy formation being completely wrong, or is it because the galaxies we were looking at have been bashed about too much by the Milky Way to be good examples for us to compare the models to? In probing these questions, my research program will use some of the newest instruments available to not only answer these key science questions, but also to understand how to better develop the underlying technology to be best suited for this science.