Publications

Mapping the Stellar Kinematics in the Central 240 Parsecs of M87 with the James Webb Space Telescope

Published in The Astrophysical Journal, 2026

Recommended citation: Al-Amri, R. M., Walsh, J. L.,Liepold, E. R., et al. 2026, Astrophys. J., 999, 238. https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-4357/ae4233

The MASSIVE Survey. XX. A Triaxial Stellar Dynamical Measurement of the Supermassive Black Hole Mass and Intrinsic Galaxy Shape of Giant Radio Galaxy NGC 315

Published in The Astrophysical Journal, 2025

Recommended citation: Pilawa, J. D., Liepold, E. R., Ma, C.-P., et al. 2025, Astrophys. J., 989, 98. https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-4357/adee1e

A 22 Billion Solar Mass Black Hole in Holmberg 15A with Keck KCWI Spectroscopy and Triaxial Orbit Modeling

Published in The Astrophysical Journal, 2025

Recommended citation: Liepold, E. R., Ma, C.-P., Walsh, J. L. 2025, Astrophys. J., 980, 58. https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-4357/ada4b0

Big Galaxies and Big Black Holes: The Massive Ends of the Local Stellar and Black Hole Mass Functions and the Implications for Nanohertz Gravitational Waves

Published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, 2024

Recommended citation: Liepold, E. R. & Ma, C.-P. 2024, Astrophys. J. Lett., 971 L29. https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/ad66b8

TriOS Schwarzschild Orbit Modeling: Robustness of Parameter Inference for Masses and Shapes of Triaxial Galaxies with Supermassive Black Holes

Published in The Astrophysical Journal, 2024

Recommended citation: Pilawa, J., Liepold, E. R., Ma, C.-P. 2024, Astrophys. J., 966, 205. https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ad3935

Realizing the Full Potential: Detecting and Measuring Supermassive Black Holes in Triaxial Galaxies

Published in University of California, Berkeley, 2023

This is my PhD dissertation!

Recommended citation: Liepold, E. R. 2023. Order No. 30633852, University of California, Berkeley. https://www.proquest.com/dissertations-theses/realizing-full-potential-detecting-measuring/docview/2867109417/se-2

Keck Integral-Field Spectroscopy of M87 Reveals an Intrinsically Triaxial Galaxy and a Revised Black Hole Mass

Published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, 2023

M87* is 5.37 billion solar masses and the stellar halo is quite triaxial!

Recommended citation: Liepold, E. R., Ma, C.-P., Walsh, J. L. 2023, Astrophys. J. Lett., 945 L35. https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/acbbcf

The MASSIVE Survey. XVII. A Triaxial Orbit-based Determination of the Black Hole Mass and Intrinsic Shape of Elliptical Galaxy NGC 2693

Published in The Astrophysical Journal, 2022

This is a paper about triaxial NGC2693!

Recommended citation: Pilawa, J. D., Liepold, E. R., Delgado Andrade, S. C., et al. 2022, Astrophys. J., 928, 178. https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ac58fd

Triaxial Orbit-based Dynamical Modeling of Galaxies with Supermassive Black Holes and an Application to Massive Elliptical Galaxy NGC 1453

Published in The Astrophysical Journal, 2022

This is a paper about triaxial models of NGC1453

Recommended citation: Quenneville, M. E., Liepold, E. R., & Ma, C.-P. 2022, Astrophys. J., 926, 30. https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ac3e68

Dynamical Modeling of Galaxies and Supermassive Black Holes: Axisymmetry in Triaxial Schwarzschild Orbit Superposition Models

Published in The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series, 2021

It turns out to be quite tricky to build valid axisymmetric Schwarzschild models within a code designed for triaxiality… Here’s how we did it!

Recommended citation: Quenneville, M. E., Liepold, E. R., Ma, C.-P. 2021, Astrophys. J. Suppl. Ser., 254, 25. https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4365/abe6a0

The MASSIVE Survey. XV. A Stellar Dynamical Mass Measurement of the Supermassive Black Hole in Massive Elliptical Galaxy NGC 1453

Published in The Astrophysical Journal, 2020

We performed Axisymmetric Schwarzschild orbit modelling on NGC1453 and found a black hole mass of about 3 billion solar masses!

Recommended citation: Liepold, E. R., Quenneville, M. E., Ma, C.-P., et al. 2020, Astrophys. J., 891, 4. https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ab6f71

Pair and many-body interactions between ligated Au nanoparticles

Published in Journal of Chemical Physics, 2019

We built fancy molecular dynamics models of thiolated gold nanoparticles and watch them interact with each other!

Recommended citation: Liepold, E. R., Smith, A., Lin, B., de Pablo, J., & Rice, S. A. 2019, J. Chem. Phys. 150, 044904. https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5064545

Transient Structured Fluctuations in a Two-dimensional System with Multiple Ordered Phases

Published in Journal of Chemical Physics, 2018

If you’re very careful, you can find transient stuctured fluctuations right at the edge of phase transitions in 2D systems!

Recommended citation: Krebs, Z., Roitman, A. B., Nowack, L.N., Liepold, E. R., Lin, B., & Rice, S. A. 2018, J. Chem. Phys. 149, 034503. https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5026680

A comment on the position dependent diffusion coefficient representation of structural heterogeneity

Published in Journal of Chemical Physics, 2018

This is a paper about the position-dependent diffusion coefficient!

Recommended citation: Wolfson, M., Liepold, E. R., Lin, B., & Rice, S. A. 2018, J. Chem. Phys. 148, 194901. https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5025921

Colloid-colloid hydrodynamic interaction around a bend in a quasi-one-dimensional channel

Published in Physical Review E, 2017

This is a paper about corners!

Recommended citation: Liepold, E. R., Zarcone, R., Heumann, T., Rice, S. A., & Lin, B. 2017, Phys. Rev. E 96, 012606. https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.96.012606