(Jay) Digvijay Wadekar
About me:
My research interests span a broad range of topics in astrophysics, gravitational-wave physics, cosmology, astroparticle physics, as well as applications of AI and machine learning across these domains. I'm an assistant professor in the physics department at UT Austin (starting Spring 2026). I was previously a postdoctoral fellow at Johns Hopkins University (JHU), and before that I was a member at the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS). I completed my PhD at the center for cosmology and particle physics (CCPP) at New York University (NYU) in 2021 and also closely worked with the CCA cosmology group.My current research develops physics-informed, interpretable machine learning models for gravitational wave astrophysics. I focus on compact object mergers—from detection and population inference to modeling their progenitors. Recently, I've been exploring agentic large language models for physics applications. My earlier work spanned cosmological pipelines for spectroscopic surveys, gas physics for CMB-SZ experiments, and dark matter phenomenology in dwarf galaxies. Check out my research page for more info.
I grew up in Nanded in India and did my bachelors in Engineering Physics at IIT Bombay. If you don't find me at my office, I may be backpacking, running or practicing latin and ballroom dancing.