The Team

Brian Sun

Hi! I’m Brian Sun, a senior from Montgomery HS in New Jersey and I’ll be attending MIT this fall. My interest in the sciences began in the summer before high school, when I built a few rocket engines in my basement out of simple curiosity. Admittedly, it wasn’t a great idea to mix industry-grade oxidizers and fuels right out of the gate, but in the years that followed, I was able to build a solid physics foundation through similar types of experiments (in other words, learning it the hard way). I eventually got certified for high power rocketry, which allowed me to fly bigger and faster. One of my proudest achievements to this day is recording one of my rockets breaking the sound barrier at Mach 1.2.

I found the USAAAO during my sophomore year through one of my Science Olympiad friends. My experience in the National Astronomy Competition opened my eyes to more advanced physics, including spherical trig, cosmology, and other uncommon topics that spiked my curiosity. I’m incredibly grateful to have the opportunity to compete at the IOAA again this year, and I’m looking forward to meeting new friends and fellow competitors. Last year’s competition week gave me some of my best memories so I’m excited to make new ones this year!!

Besides physics, I enjoy playing guitar, listening to new music, weightlifting, cooking, poker, 2am ramen (at IOAA again???), and messing around with friends on the golf course 🙂

Yuxian Liu

Hi everyone! My name is Yuxian (Iris) Liu, and I’m a rising senior at Phillips Academy in Andover, MA.

I honestly don’t remember how I got into astronomy. The closest memory I have is being stuck in a traffic jam in kindergarten and desperately wishing I could fly. (Spoiler: I could not.) I guess the sky and what’s beyond it has appealed to me ever since. That vague longing to defy gravity first led me to biology (maybe I could grow wings?), then to physics (launch myself instead?), and finally to astronomy–where I decided that maybe just looking at (and understanding) the sky is safer and less legally questionable.

The summer before high school, I took an intro astrophysics course at a summer camp, and that’s when things really clicked. I found USAAAO my freshman year and have been competing in it ever since. I’ve also done SciOly Astronomy for three years, somehow became the Earth and Space main on my school’s Science Bowl team (despite questionable accuracy), and survived a gauntlet of physics classes at school–including fluid mechanics (barely) and modern physics (happily and/or confusedly?). Right now, I’m super interested in astrophysics–especially stellar physics–and I’m determined to finally understand spherical astronomy (and how to actually use a telescope). I’m incredibly grateful for the chance to compete at IOAA this year, and am equally terrified/excited for both the training camp PSets and meeting everyone 😀

Outside of astronomy, I play ultimate frisbee in the spring and Nordic ski in the winter (surprisingly, I touch grass quite a lot). I also enjoy felting (yes, making small animals out of wool is a real hobby), watching anime or TV shows instead of studying for history quizzes, solving Rubik’s cubes and pyramixes, playing card games (and losing all my chips in poker), caring for my plants, trying video games my friends swear I’ll like, and getting my friends to go on nature walks with me that inevitably devolve into frog-chasing chaos.

Feodor Yevtushenko

Hi! I’m Feodor! I’m a junior at University High School.

When I started participating in academic competitions, I was mainly a math and physics main. I’ve competed in several such competitions like IPhO and RMM as a part of Team USA. Nevertheless, ever since I was a kid, I’ve always loved space and astrophysics – I remember bingeing every black hole documentary I could find on Netflix when I was little.

Thus, when I found out about USAAAO, it was a dream come true, as I finally had a way to integrate my math and physics experience with my love for astronomy. I borrowed my friend’s Everaise Academy astronomy textbook and grinded my way through spherical trigonometry. This year, when I took the NAC, I felt ready – and, to my surprise, I ultimately ended up making IOAA. I’m super stoked to be competing as a member of Team USA in India this year!!!

My favorite parts of physics are particle/quantum physics and cosmology. I love understanding how the universe works, both on the smallest and on the largest scales we can. In particular, I’m really curious as to what dark matter actually is – if we can solve the dark matter problem, then we’ll likely unlock an entirely new branch of physics.

In my free time, I tend to maintain a 50:50 mixture between watching random garbage on YouTube and grinding math and physics. Besides that, I play Zelda and blow time on Discord.

Aldric Benalan

Hi! I’m Aldric Benalan, a rising senior at West Windsor-Plainsboro High School North in New Jersey.

From a young age, my passion for astronomy started with stargazing at the endless sky. In middle school, I started competing in Science Olympiad and Science Bowl — it was one of the first times I saw science as something more than facts in a textbook. When I started competing in the USAAAO, my fascination with astronomy deepened. I was amazed by how much we could learn from just light — distances, temperatures, masses, compositions — all from analyzing spectra and light curves. I love that astronomy doesn’t just ask “what’s out there,” but challenges us to build models, analyze data, and apply math and physics to understand the universe from right here on Earth.

In my free time, I enjoy coding personal projects, playing basketball with my friends, playing Geoguessr, and biking.

I’m incredibly thankful to my parents, friends, and teachers for supporting me along my astrophysics journey. I’m especially looking forward to meeting passionate students from around the world who also find joy in staring at stars, solving problems, and staying up way too late thinking about the universe. I’m excited and honored to join the IOAA team this year!

Rohan Raghu

Hi! My name is Rohan Raghu and I am from New Jersey. I am a rising senior at Stanford University Online High School located in California.

I have always been passionate about physics and space (fun fact: I am related to both C.V. Raman and S. Chandrasekhar). As a toddler, I had to be dragged away from the window while staring at the moon thus earning me the nickname “moonchild.” Recently, I officially discovered my passion for Astronomy when I took an Astrophysics class at my school last fall. Setting up a telescope in the middle of a soccer field several nights a week to observe as many Messier objects as possible was fun – I found the perfect thin gloves that kept me warm while still letting me manipulate my smartphone for taking pictures through the scope. As the semester progressed, I found myself drawn to celestial mechanics to better locate deep-sky objects. In the spring, my team and I booked time on the Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope and we published a paper in the Journal of Double Star Observations.

This year, I learned about the USAAAO and prepared for the National Astronomy Competition in April. I am honored to be selected for the IOAA and excited for the chance to compete internationally. I look forward to meeting and collaborating with my teammates. I am grateful to my parents, teachers, and friends for their support and encouragement.

When I am not stargazing, I am a Ski Instructor at a nearby Pennsylvania mountain resort, spar at Karate tournaments, serve as an editor-in-chief for a New Jersey Mensa chapter, and represent my high school at Model UN conferences. This summer, I will be mountain biking with my friends and preparing with my teammates on Team USA to compete in India at the IOAA!