Employment

• Research Associate | University of Leicester (2022 -- present)

Education

• PhD Physics | University of Warwick (2018 -- 2022)
• Mphys Astrophysics, First Class | University of Edinburgh (2013 -- 2018)

Research Interests

• Planet migration in gravitationally unstable protoplanetary discs.
• Impact of planet-disc interactions on the structure of protoplanetary discs.
• Warped gravitationally unstable protoplanetary discs.
• The dust dynamics in protoplanetary discs.
• Connecting simulations with observed disc features.

Awards

• Poster Prize | New Heights in Planet Formation
• Winton Prize for an Astrophysics PhD Thesis at Warwick
• Career Development Summer Scholarships | University of Edinburgh

Publications (First Author)

• Rowther S., Nealon R., Alexander R., et al., "Leading & Trailing Spiral Arms in a Nearly Broken Protoplanetary Disc", 2025, Accepted in MNRAS

  [ADS]

• Rowther S., Price D. J., Pinte C., et al., "Short-Lived Gravitational Instability in Isolated Irradiated Discs", 2024, MNRAS, 534, 2277

  [ADS]

• Rowther S., Nealon R., Meru F., et al., "The Role of Drag and Gravity on Dust Concentration in a Gravitationally Unstable Disc", 2024, MNRAS, 528, 2490

  [ADS]

• Rowther S., Nealon R., and Meru F., "Continuing to hide signatures of gravitational instability in protoplanetary discs with planets", 2023, MNRAS, 518, 763

  [ADS]

• Rowther S., Nealon R., and Meru F., "Warping Away Gravitational Instabilities in Protoplanetary Discs", 2022, ApJ, 925, 163

  [ADS]

• Rowther S., Meru F., Kennedy G., et al., "Hiding Signatures of Gravitational Instability in Protoplanetary Discs with Planets", 2020, ApJL, 904, L18

  [ADS]

• Rowther S., & Meru F., "Planet Migration in Self-Gravitating Discs: Survival of Planets", 2020, MNRAS, 496, 1598

  [ADS]

Publications (Contributing Author)

• Rice K., Baehr H., Young A. K., et al. including Rowther S., "Dust density enhancements and the direct formation of planetary cores in gravitationally unstable discs", 2025, MNRAS, 539, 3421

  [ADS]

• Faruqi A., Kennedy G. M., Nealon R., Rowther S., "Modelling a Transiting Circumbinary Disc in the HD98800 System", 2025, MNRAS, 537, 2516

  [ADS]

• Pritchard, M. Meru F., Rowther S., et al., "Sandwiched planet formation: restricting the mass of a middle planet", 2024, MNRAS, 528, 6538

  [ADS]

• Nowak M., Rowther S., Lacour S., et al., "The orbit of HD 142527 B is too compact to explain many of the disc features", 2024, A&A, 683, A6

  [ADS]

• Rajpaul V. M., Buchhave L. A., Lacedelli G., et al. including Rowther S., "A HARPS-N mass for the elusive Kepler-37d: a case study in disentangling stellar activity and planetary signals", 2021, MNRAS, 507, 1847

  [ADS]

Conferences & Seminars

• Apr 2025

  UKEXOM 2025, Leeds, UK

  (Contributed Talk)
• Sep 2024

  UK & Ireland Discs Meeting, Coventry, UK

  (Contributed Talk)
• Jul 2024

  New Heights in Planet Formation, Garching, Germany

  (🏆 Poster)
• Jul 2024

  1st North American Phantom users workshop, Newfoundland, Canada

  (Contributed Talk)
• Feb 2024

  5th Franco-Australian Phantom + MCFOST users workshop, Melbourne, Australia

  (Invited Talk)
• Jun 2023

  Midlands Disc Meeting, Leicester

  (Contributed Talk)
• Apr 2023

  Protostars and Planets VIII, Kyoto, Japan

  (Poster)
• Feb 2023

  4th Phantom and MCFOST Users Workshop, Melbourne, Australia

  (Invited Talk)
• Sep 2022

  The hidden newly born planets | EPSC 2022, Granada, Spain

  (Contributed Talk)
• Sep 2022

  Planet and binary formation in gravitationally unstable protoplanetary discs in the high-resolution era, Leicester

  (Contributed talk)
• Aug 2022

  University of Georgia - Departmental Colloquium, Georgia, USA

  (Invited talk)
• Aug 2022

  ERES VII, Penn State

  (Poster)
• Jul 2022

  National Astronomical Meeting (NAM), Coventry

  (Contributed talk)
• Jun 2022

  MIAPP - Planet Formation: From Dust Coagulation to Final Orbit Assembly, Garching

  (Contributed talk)
• Apr 2022

  Midlands Disc Meeting, Coventry

  (Contributed talk)
• Mar 2022

  University of Cambridge - Exoplanet Meetings, Cambridge

  (Invited talk)
• Jan 2022

  Modelling of Disc Fragmentation, Planet Migration and Episodic Accretion, Virtual & Leicester

  (Contributed talk)
• Dec 2021

  University of Exeter, Virtual

  (Invited talk)
• Nov 2021

  Queen Mary University of London, London

  (Invited talk)
• Nov 2021

  University of St. Andrews - Lunchtime Talks, Virtual

  (Invited talk)
• Oct 2021

  Star Formation: From Clouds to Discs: A Tribute to the Career of Lee Hartmann, Dublin

  (Poster)
• Jun 2021

  European Astronomical Society Annual Meeting, Virtual

  (Poster)
• May 2021

  Distorted Astrophysical Discs, Virtual

  (Poster)
• May 2021

  52nd Annual Meeting of the Division on Dynamical Astronomy, Virtual

  (Contributed Talk)
• Apr 2021

  UKEXOM 2021, Virtual

  (Contributed Talk)
• Mar 2021

  Circumplanetary Disks and Satellite Formation II, Virtual

  (Poster)
• Dec 2020

  Five Years After HL Tau, Virtual

  (Contributed Talk)
• Nov 2020

  University of Leicester - Lunchtime Talks, Virtual

  (Invited talk)
• Jul 2020

  Exoplanets III, Virtual

  (Poster)
• Jun 2020

  European Astronomical Society Annual Meeting, Virtual

  (Poster)
• Dec 2019

  South East Exoplanet Meeting, London

  (Contributed talk)
• Jul 2019

  Disc-cussions, Melbourne, Australia

  (Attended)
• Jul 2019

  Great Barriers in Planet Formation, Palm Cove, Australia

  (Poster)
• Apr 2019

  UK Exoplanet meeting, London

  (Poster)
• Feb 2019

  Planet Formation and Evolution, Rostock, Germany

  (Poster)

Teaching

• 1^st Year Python Demonstrator | PX150 Physics Programming Workshop (2022)
• 2^nd Year Python Demonstrator | PX281 Computational Physics (2021)
• 2^nd Year Python Demonstrator | PX277 Computational Physics (2019, 2020)
• Lab Demonstrator | 1^st Year Electronics Lab Demonstration (2019)