Nathalie Ouellette, new iREx Coordinator

Nathalie Ouellette. (Credit: Courtesy Image)

Everyone at iREx is happy to welcome Nathalie Ouellette, the new iREx coordinator. She is taking over from Olivier Hernandez, who left the position last May to become director of the Rio Tinto Alcan Planetarium in Montreal. She will also assume some of the duties of Marie-Eve Naud, the current Scientific and Education and Public Outreach Coordinator of iREx at Université de Montréal, who has been on parental leave since October 2018. In addition to her duties at iREx, Nathalie will also take on the role of Canadian Coordinator for Webb Telescope Communications, both at the Université de Montréal—where many of the researchers associated with this space observatory are located—and at the Canadian Space Agency.

Nathalie is from Montreal, where she completed a Bachelor’s degree in Physics (Honors Program) at McGill University. She did her undergraduate thesis on galactic clusters, under the supervision of Tracy Webb. She then completed a master’s and doctoral degree at Queen’s University, Ontario, under the supervision of Stéphane Courteau. Her thesis focused on the galaxies of the Virgo cluster. Very interested in communication and scientific outreach, Nathalie worked during her doctoral studies as coordinator of the Queen’s Observatory from 2010 to 2016. After completing a certificate in science communication at Seneca College, Nathalie became the first Communications, Education & Outreach Officer for the McDonald Institute at Queen’s University in 2017, where she worked a year before joining iREx in September 2018.

Welcome, Nathalie!

To learn more about Nathalie, visit her page here.