Prof. Dr. Alessandra Buonanno
Standort Potsdam
Forschungsinteressen
Analytical (approximate) Solution of the Two-Body Problem in General Relativity; Highly-Accurate Modeling of Gravitational Waves from Full Coalescence (Inspiral, Merger and Ringdown) combining Analytical and Numerical Relativity; Astrophysical and Fundamental Physics Properties of Compact Objects (Neutron Stars and Black Holes); Tests of General Relativity with Gravitational-Wave Observations; Cosmology of the Very Early Universe; Quantum-Optical Noise in Gravitational-Wave Detectors (Quantum Non-Demolition Techniques)
Vita
Education
| 1993-1996 |
Ph.D. in Physics, University of Pisa, Italy |
| 1993 |
Master in Physics (Laurea), University of Pisa, Italy |
Academic Appointments
| 2020-present |
Research Professor, Department of Physics, University of Maryland, College Park, MD |
| 2017-present | Honorary Professor of Physics, Humboldt University, Berlin |
| 2017-present |
Honorary Professor of Physics, Potsdam University, Potsdam |
| 2014-present |
Director, Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics |
| 2014-present | Scientific Member of the Max Planck Society |
| 2014-2020 | College Park Professor, Department of Physics, University of Maryland, College Park, MD |
| 2010-2014 | Professor, Department of Physics, University of Maryland, College Park, MD |
|
Sep 2005- 2010 |
Associate Professor (tenured), Department of Physics, University of Maryland, College Park, MD |
| 2005-2014 |
Visiting Associate, Caltech, Pasadena, CA |
| Sep 2005- Aug 2012 |
Chargée de Recherche de 1 ere classe (tenured) of CNRS (on leave of absence), Laboratoire d’Astroparticule et Cosmologie (APC), Paris, France |
|
Jan 2005- Aug 2005 |
Chargée de Recherche de 1 ere classe (tenured) of CNRS, Laboratoire d’Astroparticule et Cosmologie (APC), Paris, France |
|
Dec 2001- |
Chargée de Recherche de 1 ere classe (tenured) of CNRS, Institut d’Astrophysique de Paris (IAP), Paris, France |
| Jan 2002- Oct 2002 |
Visiting Associate, Caltech, Pasadena, CA |
| 1999-2001 | Richard C. Tolman Prize Postdoctoral Fellow, Caltech, Pasadena, CA |
| 1997-1999 |
Postdoctoral Fellow, Institut des Hautes Études Scientifiques
(IHES), Bures-sur-Yvette (Paris), France |
|
Jan 1997- Sep 1997 |
Research Associate, Theoretical Division of CERN, Geneva, Switzerland |
Awards and Honors
| 2024 |
Synergy Grant of the European Research Council (ERC), together with Enrico Barausse (SISSA), Zvi Bern (University of California), and Maarten van de Meent (Niels Bohr Institute) |
| 2023 |
Oskar Klein Medal and Memorial Lecture by Stockholm University and the Nobel Committee of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences |
| 2023 |
Elected member of the Italian National Academy of Sciences |
| 2022 |
Tomalla Prize of the Tomalla Foundation for Gravity Research |
| 2021 |
Balzan Prize of the International Balzan Prize Foundation (shared with T. Damour) |
| 2021 |
Dirac Medal and Prize of the Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics (shared with T. Damour, F. Pretorius and S. Teukolsky) |
| 2021 |
Elected member of the US National Academy of Sciences |
| 2021 |
Elected member of the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina |
| 2021 |
Elected member of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities |
| 2021 |
Galileo Galilei Medal of the Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (INFN) (shared with T. Damour and F. Pretorius) |
| 2019 | 8th Benjamin Lee Professorship, Asian Pacific Center for Theoretical Physics, South Korea |
| 2018 | Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize (€ 2.5 million) of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) |
| 2016 | Lower Saxony State Prize (shared with B. Allen and K. Danzmann) |
| 2014-2020 | Distinguished Visiting Research Chair, Perimeter Institute, Waterloo, Canada |
| 2011-2012 | William and Flora Hewlett Fellow, Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA |
| 2011 | Elected Fellow of the American Physical Society (APS) |
| 2010 |
Elected Fellow of the International Society of General Relativity and Gravitation |
| 2007 |
Richard A. Ferrell Distinguished Faculty Fellowship,
|
| 2006-2008 |
Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship |
| 1999-2002 |
Richard C. Tolman Prize Fellow, Caltech, Pasadena, CA |
| 2000 |
Italian Society of General Relativity and Gravitational Physics (SIGRAV) Prize |
Awards as member of the LIGO Scientific Collaboration
| 2017 | U.K. Group Achievement Award of the Royal Astronomical Society to the LIGO Scientific Collaboration |
| 2017 | Einstein Medal of the Einstein Society in Bern, Switzerland, to the LIGO Scientific Collaboration |
| 2017 | Princess of Asturias Award for Technical and Scientific Research to R. Drever, K. Thorne and R. Weiss, and the LIGO Scientific Collaboration |
| 2017 | HEAD Bruno Rossi Prize of the American Astronomical Society (AAS) to G. Gonzalez, and the LIGO Scientific Collaboration |
| 2016 | Special Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics to R. Drever, K. Thorne and R. Weiss, and the LIGO Scientific Collaboration |
| 2016 | Gruber Cosmology Prize to R. Drever, K. Thorne and R. Weiss, and the LIGO Scientific Collaboration |
| 2023- present | Member of the Dirac Medal Committee |
| 2023- present | Member of the Research Board of the Austrian Academy of Sciences |
| 2023- present |
Member of the Solvay International Scientific Committee for Physics |
| 2022-present |
Member of the Committee of the Aspen Institute Italia Award for Scientific Research and Collaboration between Italy and the United States |
| 2019-2021 |
Member of the Senior Committee (appointed by the Director of Science) of the European Space Agency (ESA) for Voyage 2050 |
| 2019-present | Member of the Kavli Prize Committee in Astrophysics |
| 2019-present | Member of the Advisory Board of the Institut d’Astrophysique de Paris, Paris |
| 2018-present | Member of the Advisory Board of the Walter Burke Institute for Theoretical Physics, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA |
| 2018-present | Member of the LISA Consortium Board |
| 2017-2019 | Member of the Gravitational Physics Division (GPD) Board of the European Physical Society |
| 2012-2015 |
Member of the Committee of International Freedom of Scientists of the American Physical Society (APS) |
| 2010-2013 |
Member of the Advisory Board of KITP, Santa Barbara, CA |
| 2005-present |
Principal Investigator of the LIGO Scientific Collaboration |