About lightcurve.ai
About the group
lightcurve.ai is a computational astrophysics group at the Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), Mumbai. The group works with lightcurve data — photon counts measured by telescopes — to study the interiors of the Sun and stars through helio- and asteroseismology, and to detect and characterise exoplanets through transits and radial-velocity signals. A secondary research area applies the same seismic-inversion machinery to terrestrial geophysics.
Modern observatories produce data faster than human analysts can process it. Missions like Kepler, TESS, SDO, and the upcoming PLATO generate petabytes of observations; by the time a group completes a first pass on one dataset, the next instrument is already returning data.
lightcurve.ai uses the available data, applying modern computational algorithms and statistical inference methods to accelerate astrophysical discovery.
The group is funded by the Department of Atomic Energy through TIFR, with additional grant support from Premji Invest and the Murty Trust. Active research collaborations include the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, Caltech, and Google DeepMind.
Why now
Three forces have converged to make this work both possible and timely.
A data deluge
Space- and ground-based missions produce more astrophysical data each year than the field has historically processed. Kepler, TESS, SDO, and PLATO are generating petabytes of observations that cannot be examined by hand.
Computational maturity
Statistical and machine-learning techniques have matured to the point where they can address scientific questions, not just engineering ones. The methods are ready to be applied to frontier problems in astrophysics and geophysics.
Computational algorithms to decode data
Modern computational algorithms — neural networks, Bayesian inference, simulation-based methods — make it possible to extract structured signal from observational time series at scale. Algorithms and simulations play complementary roles: simulations generate the synthetic data that algorithms learn from, and algorithms convert real observations into testable inferences.
Institution
Hosted at TIFR
The Tata Institute of Fundamental Research is one of India's premier institutions for fundamental science, founded by Homi J. Bhabha and supported by the Department of Atomic Energy. Its Department of Astronomy & Astrophysics is among its flagship groups. Lightcurve is based on TIFR's Mumbai campus, on the waterfront at Colaba.
TIFR campus photo
Origins
From the Seismology Group
The group developed out of the former TIFR Seismology Group, which had built its reputation on helioseismology and the computational methods used to image the solar interior. Grant support from Premji Invest and the Murty Trust subsequently broadened the work into asteroseismology and exoplanet analysis, and an ongoing research collaboration with Google DeepMind extends the group's methodological reach.
The team
Meet the team
Principal investigator, postdocs, PhD students, junior research fellows, scientific staff, advisors, and alumni.