IOA - Key Persons


Mahsa Zohhadi

Job Titles:
  • Co - Ordinator
Mahsa Zohhadi, the Undergraduate Student Co-ordinator, and Carolyn Young, the Postgraduate Admissions & Examinations Co-ordinator share an office with Debbie and should be able to help you in her absence.

Mandy Cockrill

Job Titles:
  • Building Services Technician & Assistant Safety Officer
Mandy Cockrill is the IoA's Building Services Technician & Assistant Safety Officer. If you have any problems with your office or notice anything that is broken please email repairs@ast.cam.ac.uk.

Miss Amanda Smith

Amanda Smith is the Graphics Officer at the IoA. In other words, she can make pictures, diagrams and posters, including very large ones, look as good as possible for presentation and publication. In addition, she provides bespoke illustrations, graphics and print-ready brochures and can also liaise with the AVMG, a University of Cambridge Audio VIsual service, if you require a service that she's not able to offer in-house.

Mr David Savidge

David Savidge (dws27@cam.ac.uk) is Deputy Administrator with particular responsibility for Finance, Buildings and Grounds and is also the Safety Officer. David is Angela's deputy when she is absent or not available.

Mrs Angela Macharia

Job Titles:
  • Departmental Administrator

Mrs Debbie Peterson

Debbie Peterson (post-graduate.admin@ast.cam.ac.uk) is the Senior Student Administrator and also a departmental Wellbeing Advocate. Based in the H4, she oversees all aspects of Postgraduate Student administration from pre-admission enquiries, interviews, admissions, current student assessment processes, right through to the production of your PhD dissertation and examination. Debbie can advise on funding for Conferences, Observing trips etc., will arrange flights and can help you with the form-filling and sometimes complex University paperwork. If you encounter any problems or have concerns of a non-scientific nature during your time at the IoA you should talk to Debbie in the first instance. She will often be able to help and, if not, she will certainly be able to point you to the most appropriate person. If you have any problems interacting with specific academic staff or have problems in your relationship with your supervisor you should also inform Debbie or Paul Hewett at an early stage.

Paul C Hewett

Job Titles:
  • Director of Postgraduate Education

Prof. Hiranya Peiris

Hiranya Peiris holds the Professorship of Astrophysics (1909) at the Institute of Astronomy, University of Cambridge. She is a Professorial Fellow at Murray Edwards College. She is a member of the Kavli Insittute for Cosmology, Cambridge. After obtaining her undergraduate degree at Cambridge (1998), where she was a member of New Hall, Hiranya completed her PhD at Princeton (2003). She was a Hubble Fellow at Chicago (2004-2007) before returning to Cambridge as a STFC Halliday Fellow (2007). She was then appointed to a lectureship (2009) and Professorship (2015) at UCL. She was Director of the Oskar Klein Centre in Stockholm (2016-2022) and Director of the UCL Cosmoparticle Initiative (2016-2023). She holds a second affiliation at the Oskar Klein Centre, Stockholm University. Hiranya served as Vice-President (Astronomy) of the Royal Astronomical Society during 2016-2018. She is currently serving as a member of STFC Council, the senior strategic advisory body of the research council that funds particle physics and astronomy in the United Kingdom.