José Flores Velázquez, a grad student studying Physics and Astronomy at the University of California – Irvine, was shot dead outside his friend’s home in south Los Angeles, 14 August 2019.
Flores was pursuing a PhD in astrophysics, and had special expertise using supercomputers to perform kinematic simulations of galaxies using the Feedback In Realistic Environments (FIRE) method, first working with Jorge Moreno at CalPoly Pomona, and then over summer 2017 with Claude-André Faucher-Giguère at Northwestern University in Chicago. Flores’s work was featured in the Council on Undergraduate Research’s 2018 “Posters on the Hill” event at the United States Capitol, and had earned a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship.
A gofundme campaign was started to assist his family with funeral expenses.
