Seppo Mattila
 

Department of Physics and Astronomy

sepmat@utu.fi

+358 29 450 4518

+358 50 412 5859

Vesilinnantie 5

Turku


: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7497-2994

I received my PhD degree from Imperial College, Univ. of London in 2002. After this I held postdoctoral positions at Stockholm University, Helsinki University of Technology (now Aalto University) and Queen's University Belfast. I moved back to Finland in 2007 with an Academy of Finland Research Fellowship to work at Tuorla Observatory at University of Turku. Between 2012 and 2015 I worked at the Finnish Centre for Astronomy with ESO (FINCA) as a University Researcher. I was appointed as a Professor of Astronomy at the Department of Physics and Astronomy at University of Turku in 2015. After 2010 I have made extended research visits to Stockholm University (18 months) and to University of Cambridge, UK (10 months). I have been the Finnish delegate in the European Southern Observatory (ESO) Council since 2020 and in the International Scientific Committee (CCI) of the Roque de los Muchachos and Teide observatories since 2019. Since 2022 I have also served as the President of the CCI. I am currently also the President of the Finnish National Committee for Astronomy and a member of the Nordic Optical Telescope (NOT) Council and the board of FINCA, and a vice member of the board of the Univ. of Turku Faculty of Science. In 2022 I was invited as a member of the Finnish Academy of Science and Letters.



​​​​​​My main research interests focus on observational work on extragalactic astrophysical transients, including supernovae, tidal disruption events, and kilonovae. For more details on my research and information on the research group please see https://sites.utu.fi/sne/. For a complete list of my refereed journal papers see ADS (in chronological order) or ADS (ordered by number of citations).

Selected recent papers:

Reynolds, Thomsen, Mattila et al. 2025, A&A: Infrared observations reveal the reprocessing envelope in the tidal disruption event AT 2019azh

Matilainen, Kankare, Mattila et al. 2025, A&A: Long-term evolution of the SN 2009ip-like transient SN 2016cvk

Mäntynen, Kankare, Mattila et al. 2025, A&A: The undetectable fraction of core-collapse supernovae in luminous infrared galaxies

Gutiérrez, Mattila et al. 2024, ApJ: CSS 161010: A Luminous Fast Blue Optical Transient with Broad Blueshifted Hydrogen Lines

Nagao, Maeda, Mattila et al. 2024, A&A: Evidence for bipolar explosions in Type IIP supernovae

Kool et al. (incl. Mattila) 2023, Nature: A radio-detected type Ia supernova with helium-rich circumstellar material

Pasham et al. (incl. Mattila) 2023, Nature Astronomy: The Birth of a Relativistic Jet Following the Disruption of a Star by a Cosmological Black Hole

Reynolds, Mattila et al. 2022, A&A: Energetic nuclear transients in luminous and ultraluminous infrared galaxies

Perez-Torres, Mattila et al. 2021, The Astronomy and Astrophysics Review: Star formation and nuclear activity in luminous infrared galaxies: An infrared through radio review

Kool, Reynolds, Mattila et al. 2020, MNRAS: AT2017gbl: a dust obscured TDE candidate in a luminous infrared galaxy

Ackley et al. (incl. Mattila) 2020, A&A: Observational constraints on the optical and near-infrared emission from the neutron star-black hole binary merger S190814bv

Reynolds, Fraser, Mattila et al. 2020, MNRAS: SN 2016gsd: An unusually luminous and linear type II supernova with high velocities

Mattila et al. 2018, Science: A dust-enshrouded tidal disruption event with a resolved radio jet in a galaxy merger​

Smartt et al. (incl. Mattila) 2017, Nature: A kilonova as the electromagnetic counterpart to a gravitational-wave source​

Abbott et al. (imcl. Mattila) 2017, ApJ: Multi-messenger Observations of a Binary Neutron Star Merger

Kankare, Kotak, Mattila et al. 2017, Nature Astronomy: A population of highly energetic transient events in the centres of active galaxies



I have taught several courses in astronomy, astrophysics and signal and image processing at the Univ. of Turku. In  particular, I initiated two new observational astronomy courses currently offered at national level for students from Turku, Helsinki, Oulu and the Aalto University. These courses offer hands-on experience on the use of the Nordic Optical Telescope (NOT) remotely from Univ. of Turku (Observational Techniques Using the Nordic Optical Telescope) and on the science exploitation of data from the European Southern Observatory (ESO; Data Processing Techniques for Astronomy with ESO Instrumentation). Currently I teach also the BSc course on observational astronomy and the MSc courses Spectroscopic Diagnostics in Astrophysics and Signal and Image Processing. In my teaching I always try to make use of examples from the latest research in order to offer a motivating learning experience for the students.



  
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  • Progress and tests on the instrument control electronics for SOXS  (2020)  
    • Proceedings of SPIE : the International Society for Optical Engineering
    Software and Cyberinfrastructure for Astronomy VI, Proceedings of SPIE Rappaport M., Ricci D., Riva M., Salasnich B., Kotilainen J., Li Causi G., Mattila S., Radhakrishnan K., Smartt S., Zanmar Sanchez R., Stritzinger M., Ventura H., Colapietro M., D'Orsi S., Capasso G., Marty L., Schipani P., Campana S., Claudi R., Savarese S., Coretti I., Ben-Ami S., Biondi F., Aliverti M., Baruffolo A., D'Avanzo P., Hershko O., Cosentino R., D'Alessio F., Munari M., Pignata G., Kuncarayakti H., Landoni M., Young D., Vitali F., Scuderi S., Rubin A., Brucalassi A., Arcavi I., Araiza-Duran J.A., Achrén J., De Pascale M., Della Valle M., Cappellaro E., Bruch R., Hernandez M., Genoni M., Gal-Yam A., Di Benedetto R.


  • Progress on the UV-VIS arm of SOXS  (2020)  
    • Proceedings of SPIE : the International Society for Optical Engineering
    Proceedings of SPIE: Ground-based and Airborne Instrumentation for Astronomy VIII Adam Rubin, Sagi Ben-Ami, Ofir Hershko, Michael Rappaport, Avishay Gal-Yam, Rachel Bruch, Sergio Campana, Riccardo Claudi, Pietro Schipani, Matteo Aliverti, Andrea Baruffolo, Federico Biondi, Giulio Capasso, Rosario Cosentino, Francesco D'Alessio, Paolo D'Avanzo, Hanindyo Kuncarayakti, Marco Landoni, Matteo Munari, Giuliano Pignata, Salvatore Scuderi, Fabrizio Vitali, David Young, Jani Achrén, José Antonio Araiza-Duran, Iair Arcavi, Anna Brucalassi, Enrico Cappellaro, Mirko Colapietro, Massimo Della Valle, Marco De Pascale, Rosario Di Benedetto, Sergio D'Orsi, Thomas Flügel-Paul, Matteo Genoni, Marcos Hernandez, Jari Kotilainen, Gianluca Li Causi, Seppo Mattila, Kalyan Radhakrishnan, Davide Ricci, Marco Riva, Susann Sadlowski, Bernardo Salasnich, Stephen Smartt, Ricardo Zanmar Sanchez, Maximilian Stritzinger, Hector Ventura


  • Searching for electromagnetic counterparts to gravitational-wave merger events with the prototype Gravitational-Wave Optical Transient Observer (GOTO-4)  (2020)  
    • Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
     Gompertz BP, Cutter R, Steeghs D, Galloway DK, Lyman J, Ulaczyk K, Dyer MJ, Ackley K, Dhillon VS, O'Brien PT, Ramsay G, Poshyachinda S, Kotak R, Nuttall L, Breton RP, Palle E, Pollacco D, Thrane E, Aukkaravittayapun S, Awiphan S, Brown MJI, Burhanudin U, Chote P, Chrimes AA, Daw E, Duffy C, Eyles-Ferris RAJ, Heikkila T, Irawati P, Kennedy MR, Killestein T, Levan AJ, Littlefair S, Makrygianni L, Marsh T, Sanchez DM, Mattila S, Maund J, McCormac J, Mkrtichian D, Mong YL, Mullaney J, Muller B, Obradovic A, Rol E, Sawangwit U, Stanway ER, Starling RLC, Strom PA, Tooke S, West R, Wiersema K


  • SN 2016gsd: an unusually luminous and linear Type II supernova with high velocities  (2020)  
    • Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
     Reynolds TM, Fraser M, Mattila S, Ergon M, Lundqvist P, Dessart L, Dong SB, Elias-Rosa N, Galbany L, Gutierrez CP, Kangas T, Kankare E, Kotak R, Kuncarayakti H, Pastorello A, Rodriguez O, Smartt SJ, Stritzinger M, Tomasella L, Chen P, Harmanen J, Hozzeinzadeh G, Howell DA, Inserra C, Nicholl M, Nielsen M, Smith K, Somero A, Tronsgaard R, Young DR


  • SOXS: effects on optical performances due to gravity flexures, temperature variations, and subsystems alignment  (2020)  
    • Proceedings of SPIE : the International Society for Optical Engineering
    Proceedings of SPIE: Ground-based and Airborne Instrumentation for Astronomy VIII Ricardo Zanmar Sanchez, Matteo Aliverti, Matteo Munari, Sergio Campana, Riccardo Claudi, Pietro Schipani, Andrea Baruffolo, Sagi Ben-Ami, Federico Biondi, Giulio Capasso, Rosario Cosentino, Francesco D'Alessio, Paolo D'Avanzo, Ofir Hershko, Hanindyo Kuncarayakti, Marco Landoni, Giuliano Pignata, Adam Rubin, Salvatore Scuderi, Fabrizio Vitali, David Young, Jani Achrén, José Antonio Araiza-Duran, Iair Arcavi, Anna Brucalassi, Rachel Bruch, Enrico Cappellaro, Mirko Colapietro, Massimo Della Valle, Marco De Pascale, Rosario Di Benedetto, Sergio D'Orsi, Avishay Gal-Yam, Matteo Genoni, Marcos Hernandez, Jari Kotilainen, Gianluca Li Causi, Seppo Mattila, Michael Rappaport, Kalyan Radhakrishnan, Davide Ricci, Marco Riva, Bernardo Salasnich, Stephen Smartt, Maximilian Stritzinger, Hector Ventura


  • SOXS end-to-end simulator: Development and applications for pipeline design  (2020)  
    • Proceedings of SPIE : the International Society for Optical Engineering
    Proceedings Volume 11450, Modeling, Systems Engineering, and Project Management for Astronomy IX Zanmar Sanchez R., Stritzinger M., Ventura H., Rappaport M., Ricci D., Salasnich B., Smartt S., Landoni M., Genoni M., Pariani G., Li Causi G., Campana S., Alierti M., Claudi R., Schipani P., D'Avanzo P., Riva M., Munari M., Rubin A., Capasso G., Cosentino R., Baruffolo A., Biondi F., Kuncarayakti H., Pignata G., D'Alessio F., Hershko O., Ben-Ami S., Vitali F., Scuderi S., Radhakrishnan K., Araiza-Duran J.A., Achrén J., Brucalass A., Young D., Colapietro M., Cappellaro E., Bruch R., Arcavi I., D'Orsi S., Di Benedetto R., De Pascale M., Della Valle M., Mattila S., Kotilainen J., Hernandez Diaz M., Gal-Yam A.


  • The AIV strategy of the common path of Son Of X-Shooter  (2020)  
    • Proceedings of SPIE : the International Society for Optical Engineering
    Proceedings of SPIE: Ground-based and Airborne Instrumentation for Astronomy VIII Federico Biondi, Kalyan Kumar Radhakrishnan Santhakumari, Riccardo Claudi, Matteo Aliverti, Luca Marafatto, Davide Greggio, Marco Dima, Gabriele Umbriaco, Nancy Elias-Rosa, Sergio Campana, Pietro Schipani, Andrea Baruffolo, Sagi Ben-Ami, Giulio Capasso, Rosario Cosentino, Francesco D'Alessio, Paolo D'Avanzo, Ofir Hershko, Hanindyo Kuncarayakti, Marco Landoni, Matteo Munari, Giuliano Pignata, Adam Rubin, Salvatore Scuderi, Fabrizio Vitali, David Young, Jani Achrén, José Antonio Araiza-Durán, Iair Arcavi, Anna Brucalassi, Rachel Bruch, Enrico Cappellaro, Mirko Colapietro, Massimo Della Valle, Marco De Pascale, Rosario Di Benedetto, Sergio D'Orsi, Avishay Gal-Yam, Matteo Genoni, Marcos Hernandez Diaz, Jari Kotilainen, Gianluca Li Causi, Seppo Mattila, Michael Rappaport, Davide Ricci, Marco Riva, Bernardo Salasnich, Stephen Smartt, Ricardo Zánmar Sánchez, Maximilian Stritzinger, Héctor Pérez Ventura


  • The development status of the NIR Arm of the new SoXS instrument at the ESO/NTT telescope  (2020)  
    • Proceedings of SPIE : the International Society for Optical Engineering
    Proceedings of SPIE: Ground-based and Airborne Instrumentation for Astronomy VIII F. Vitali, M. Aliverti, G. Capasso, F. D'Alessio, M. Munari, M. Riva, S. Scuderi, R. Zanmar Sánchez, S. Campana, P. Schipani, R. Claudi, A. Baruffolo, S. Ben-Ami, F. Biondi, A. Brucalassi, R. Cosentino, D. Ricci, P. D'Avanzo, H. Kuncarayakti, A. Rubin, J. Achrén, J. A. Araiza-Durán, I. Arcavi, A. Bianco, R. Bruch, E. Cappellaro, M. Colapietro, M. Della Valle, M. De Pascale, R. Di Benedetto, S. D'Orsi, D. Fantinel, A. Gal-Yam, M. Genoni, M. Hernandez, O. Hershko, J. Kotilainen, M. Landoni, G. Li Causi, S. Mattila, G. Pignata, K. Radhakrishnan, M. Rappaport, B. Salasnich, S. Smartt, M. Stritzinger, E. Ventura, D. Young


  • The long-lived Type IIn SN 2015da: Infrared echoes and strong interaction within an extended massive shell  (2020)  
    • Astronomy and Astrophysics
     L. Tartaglia, A. Pastorello, J. Sollerman, C. Fransson, S. Mattila, M. Fraser, F. Taddia, L. Tomasella, M. Turatto, A. Morales-Garoffolo, N. Elias-Rosa, P. Lundqvist, J. Harmanen, T. Reynolds, E. Cappellaro, C. Barbarino, A. Nyholm, E. Kool, E. Ofek, X. Gao, Z. Jin, H. Tan, D. J. Sand, F. Ciabattari, X. Wang, J. Zhang, F. Huang, W. Li, J. Mo, L. Rui, D. Xiang, T. Zhang, G. Hosseinzadeh, D. A. Howell, C. McCully, S. Valenti, S. Benetti, E. Callis, A. S. Carracedo, C. Fremling, T. Kangas, A. Rubin, A. Somero, G. Terreran


  • The Most Rapidly Declining Type I Supernova 2019bkc/ATLAS19dqr  (2020)  
    • Astrophysical Journal Letters
     Ping Chen, Subo Dong, M. D. Stritzinger, Simon Holmbo, Jay Strader, C. S. Kochanek, Eric W. Peng, S. Benetti, D. Bersier, Sasha Brownsberger, David A. H. Buckley, Mariusz Gromadzki, Shane Moran, A. Pastorello, Elias Aydi, Subhash Bose, Thomas Connor, K. Boutsia, F. Di Mille, N. Elias-Rosa, K. Decker French, Thomas W.-S. Holoien, Seppo Mattila, B. J. Shappee, Antony A. Stark, Samuel J. Swihart


  • The SOXS data-reduction pipeline  (2020)  
    • Proceedings of SPIE : the International Society for Optical Engineering
    Proceedings of SPIE: Software and Cyberinfrastructure for Astronomy VI Sanchez R.Z., Stritzinger M., Ventura H., Radhakrishnan K., Ricci D., Riva M., Salasnich B., Young D.R., Smartt S.J., Landoni M., Claudi R., Campana S., Aliverti M., Schipani P., Biondi F., Capasso G., Baruffolo A., Ben-Ami S., D'Avanzo P., Hershko O., Cosentino R., D'Alessio F., Pignata G., Rubin A., Kuncarayakti H., Munari M., Achrén J., Araiza-Duran J.A., Scuderi S., Vitali F., Cappellaro E., Bruch R., Brucalassi A., Arcavi I., Di Benedetto R., De Pascale M., Della Valle M., Colapietro M., Hernandez M., Genoni M., Gal-Yam A., D'Orsi S., Rappaport M., Mattila S., Li Causi G., Kotilainen J.


  • A progenitor candidate for the type II-P supernova SN 2018aoq in NGC 4151  (2019)  
    • Astronomy and Astrophysics
     O'Neill D., Kotak R., Fraser M., Sim S. A., Benetti S., Smartt S. J., Mattila S., Ashall C., Callis E., Elias-Rosa N., Gromadzki M., Prentice S. J.


  • Discovery and follow-up of the unusual nuclear transient OGLE17aaj  (2019)  
    • Astronomy and Astrophysics
     Gromadzki M, Hamanowicz A, Wyrzykowski L, Sokolovsky KV, Fraser M, Kozlowski S, Guillochon J, Arcavi I, Trakhtenbrot B, Jonker PG, Mattila S, Udalski A, Szymanski MK, Soszynski I, Poleski R, Pietrukowicz P, Skowron J, Mroz P, Ulaczyk K, Pawlak M, Rybicki KA, Sollerman J, Taddia F, Kostrzewa-Rutkowska Z, Onori F, Young DR, Maguire K, Smartt SJ, Inserra C, Gal-Yam A, Rau A, Chen TW, Angus CR, Buckley DAH, Buckley DAH


  • Evidence for rapid disc formation and reprocessing in the X-ray bright tidal disruption event candidate AT 2018fyk  (2019)  
    • Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
     Wevers T, Pasham DR, van Velzen S, Leloudas G, Schulze S, Miller-Jones JCA, Jonker PG, Gromadzki M, Kankare E, Hodgkin ST, Wyrzykowski L, Kostrzewa-Rutkowska Z, Moran S, Berton M, Maguire K, Onori F, Mattila S, Nicholl M


  • NUTS2 spectroscopic classification of ASASSN-19jy (AT2019dke) as a young Type II supernova  (2019)  Astronomer’s telegram Holmbo S, Stritzinger M, Nowack G, Vallely SP, Stanek K, Elias-Rosa N, Kankare E, Heikkilä T, Kotak R, Kuncarayakti H, Mattila S, Reynolds T, Lundqvist P, Ergon M, Pastorello A, Benetti S, Reguitti A, Fiore A, Valerin G, Cai YZ, Fraser M, Moran S, Dong S, Chen P, Bose A, Albrecht S, Collaboration N


  • Optical follow-up of the tidal disruption event iPTF16fnl: new insights from X-shooter observations  (2019)  
    • Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
     Onori F, Cannizzaro G, Jonker PG, Fraser M, Kostrzewa-Rutkowska Z, Martin-Carrillo A, Benetti S, Elias-Rosa N, Gromadzki M, Harmanen J, Mattila S, Strizinger MD, Terreran G, Wevers T


  • Radio detection of the tidal disruption event AT2019azh  (2019)  Astronomer’s telegram Perez-Torres M, Moldon J, Mattila S, Alberdi A, Beswick R, Ryder S, Varenius E, Fraser M, Kankare E, Kool E


  • SN2016coi (ASASSN-16fp): An Energetic H-stripped Core-collapse Supernova from a Massive Stellar Progenitor with Large Mass Loss  (2019)  
    • Astrophysical Journal
     Terreran G, Margutti R, Bersier D, Brimacombe J, Caprioli D, Challis P, Chornock R, Coppejans DL, Dong S, Guidorzi C, Hurley K, Kirshner R, Migliori G, Milisavljevic D, Palmer DM, Prieto JL, Tomasella L, Marchant P, Pastorello A, Shappee BJ, Stanek KZ, Stritzinger MD, Benetti S, Chen P, Demarchi L, Elias-Rosa N, Gall C, Harmanen J, Mattila S, Mattila S


  • Son of X–Shooter: A multi–band instrument for a multi–band universe  (2019)  
    • POS Proceedings of Science
    Frontier Research in Astrophysics – III (FRAPWS2018) - Ongoing Experiments Claudi R., Campana S., Schipani P., Aliverti M., Baruffolo A., Ben-Ami S., Biondi F., Brucalassi A., Capasso G., Cosentino R., D’Alessio F., D’Avanzo P., Hershko O., Kuncarayakti H., Munari M., Rubin A., Scuderi S., Vitali F., Achrén J., Antonio Araiza-Duran J., Arcavi I., Bianco A., Cappellaro E., Colapietro M., Della Valle M., Diner O., D’Orsi S., Fantinel D., Fynbo J., Gal-Yam A., Genoni M., Hirvonen M., Kotilainen J., Kumar T., Landoni M., Lehti J., Li Causi G.


  • Spectroscopic classification of AT2019sou  (2019)  Astronomer's Telegram Marco Berton, Anton Glad, Kosti Koistinen, Philipp Oleynik, Erkki Kankare, Seppo Mattila



Last updated on 2025-12-09 at 13:46