Suzanne Stewart
Staff Writer
When the director position at the Green Bank Observatory became available, Tony Remijan saw it as a new challenge and another great opportunity in his long career in astronomy.
Remijan was serving as assistant director for science support and research for the National Radio Astronomy Observatory when he was named interim director February 10.
“I really love and enjoy new challenges,” he said. “My career at NRAO has kind of moved around where I was given an opportunity to challenge myself and be successful. I look for opportunities that challenge me to grow as a scientist, as a manager, as a person and this was a great opportunity to do all those things.”
From a young age, Remijan knew astronomy was his future. He says his parents were always supportive of his pursuit of the path.
“My dad asked, ‘can you make any money doing this’ and I’m like, ‘I don’t know, but I really love doing it,’” he said. “They were all very, very supportive in giving me what I needed to be successful in astronomy.”
Remijan, who was born and raised just outside of Chicago, Illinois, received his astronomy degree from the University of Illinois. He got a master’s in astrophysics from Iowa State and returned to UI to get his PhD in astronomy and astrochemistry.
He worked at the NASA Goddard Spaceflight Center with Mike Hollis before he joined the NRAO and became very familiar with the Green Bank Telescope.
“That’s when we first started coming to the GBT,” he said of his time working with Hollis. “It was about 2004, and we had a bunch of time on the GBT. It’s been incredible ever since. Twenty years of just coming out here and working on the GBT, doing my science.”
Most of this time was spent in Charlottesville, Virginia, where he was based with the NRAO, but he also traveled a lot for research, including to Chile to work on the ALMA – Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array.
During those many visits to Green Bank to do research on the GBT, Remijan was joined by his two children, a daughter and a son, who have enjoyed experiencing the attractions of Pocahontas County, including the telescopes, but haven’t been inspired to follow in their dad’s footsteps.
“It’s incredible to watch them pursue a completely different path than I did and that’s great,” he said. “I did something completely different from what my parents did and so that’s what they want to pursue. That’s their passion. I’m supportive of that.”
They are both into the arts with one looking at interior design and architecture, while the other is interested in game art and design.
Remijan has been at Green Bank for just two weeks now, but he hit the ground running and is focused on setting goals for the future.
“We’re coming into an interesting time where we’re looking at what our next decade is of what we want to do as an observatory,” he said. “We have some strategic initiatives that we’re looking at – scientifically and technically.
“We have Breakthrough Listen which was a great initiative to kind of advance that search for techno-signatures; we have the astrochemistry that was really important to my science, but the question is – are those things going to take us into the next ten years?” he continued. “They’ve done well for the observatory in the past, but what are we looking for toward the future.”
Since he is still evaluating and learning more about the observatory, Remijan said he doesn’t have any specific goals in mind, but he knows he wants to reach out to the scientific community as well as the local community.
“That’s my big goal here,” he said. “We want to get people excited about science, technology, engineering and mathematics, and we want to get as many folks here as we can to see what we do here and see that it’s important, not just for science – it brings jobs to the area; it brings new opportunities to the area.
“My goals are to really look at the next ten years of what the GBT is going to do scientifically and technically,” he continued. “We’re going to reach out more to the scientific community – get them interested in our new initiatives and what we’re going to do; and then be a good steward to the community here in Pocahontas County.”
Remijan said he is always open to talk to anyone about the observatory and his job there.
“My door is open,” he said. “I’m happy to talk to people as they want to know more about me or about the observatory. If anyone is interested, they can feel free to come and talk to me, especially about science. I think that some of the science that we do and some of the science that I do – even if you don’t understand all the technicalities of everything – it’s just interesting that we do it here at Green Bank.
“It’s unique and it’s not done anywhere else,” he continued. “I think that we, as an observatory, are very proud of what we do here, and I think West Virginia should be really proud of what we do here.”