Stefi Baum

Stefi Alison Baum (born December 11, 1958) is an American-Canadian astrophysicist whose research focuses on active galactic nuclei, radio galaxies, and the role of supermassive black holes in galaxy evolution. She has published over 230 refereed papers and has been cited more than 22,000 times.

Baum spent over a decade at the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI), where she contributed to the development and commissioning of the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS) for the Hubble Space Telescope and led the institute's data archive and engineering divisions. She later directed the Chester F. Carlson Center for Imaging Science at the Rochester Institute of Technology (2004–2014) and served as Dean of the Faculty of Science at the University of Manitoba (2014–2022).

Baum is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (2017), a Legacy Fellow of the American Astronomical Society (2020), and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada (2025).

Early life and education Baum was born in Chicago, Illinois, and grew up in Princeton, New Jersey, where she graduated from Princeton High School in 1976. During her time at RIT, she secured over $20 million in external grants and contracts. She served as dean until 2022 and remains a professor of physics and astronomy at the university.

Research Baum's research centres on the interplay between supermassive black holes, active galactic nuclei (AGN), and their host galaxies. Working frequently with collaborator Christopher P. O'Dea, she has studied how relativistic jets from supermassive black holes interact with the surrounding interstellar medium, driving gas outflows and influencing star formation on galactic scales. 1999 – NASA Excellence Award, Hubble Space Telescope Servicing Mission 3A 2002–2003 – American Institute of Physics–US State Department Science Diplomacy Fellowship 2017 – Elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science 2020 – Elected Legacy Fellow, American Astronomical Society 2025 – Elected Fellow, Royal Society of Canada