People



Core Faculty


  1. •Dana Fine, UMassD Math, MA

  2. •Robert Fisher, UMassD Physics, MA

  3. •J. P. Hsu, UMassD Physics, MA

  4. •Gaurav Khanna, UMassD Physics, MA



Collaborative Faculty


  1. •Martin Bojowald, Penn State, PA

  2. •Lior Burko, UAlabama, AL

  3. •Richard Price, UTexas Brownsville, TX

  4. •Scott Hughes, MIT, MA

  5. •Jorge Pullin, Louisiana State, LA

  6. •Alessandra Buonanno, UMaryland, MD


Current Students


  1. •Dan Walsh, UMassD Physics, MA

  2. •SungHoon Kim, UMassD Physics, MA

  3. •Mike DeSousa, UMassD Physics, MA

  4. •Gary Forrester, UMassD Physics, MA

  5. •Justin McKennon, UMassD ECE, MA




Past Students (Current Location)


  1. •Dave Falta, Michigan State Univ.

  2. •Matthew Hogan, Florida Atlantic Univ.

  3. •Rakesh Ginjupalli, Industry

  4. •Sarah McLeod, Univ. of Melbourne

  5. •Ian Nagle, Univ. Amsterdam

  6. •Joshua Liberty, Univ. of Rhode Island

  7. •Emanuel Simon, Univ. of Ulm, Germany

  8. •Francis Boateng, UMass Lowell

  9. •Subir Sabharwal, Columbia Univ.

  10. •Vishnu Paruchuri, Columbia U. Finance

  11. •Jessica Rosen, Industry

  12. •Peter Goetz, Univ. of Ulm, Germany

  13. •Seth Connors, High-School Teacher

  14. •Zhenhua Ning, Univ. of Illinois UC

  15. •Nobuhiro Suzuki, Univ. of Rhode Island

  16. •Mike O'Brien, Rutgers Univ.

  17. •Matt Strafuss, MIT




This section is dedicated to the ongoing research projects of our group related to black hole physics. Initials of the faculty involved, are in parentheses.


Projects



  1. •Binary Black Hole Coalescence using Perturbation Theory (GK,JP,SH,LB,RP,AB)


  1. This project deals with estimating properties of the gravitational waves produced by the merger of two black holes. This is of direct relevance to the various gravitational wave observatories that are being built world-wide (eg. LIGO, LISA). For more information: this link is a popular article about our work published by Nature Magazine. And here is   another link that is a Discovery Magazine popular article of our very recent work. Here are some movies and snapshots, showing the gravitational waves emerging from coalescence of two black holes using techniques developed by us: side view, top view, more movies, snapshot.

  2. •Radiative “Tails” in Black Hole Space-times (LB,GK,JP,RP)


  1. This project is about understanding the late-time behavior of various physical fields evolving in the space-time of black holes a.k.a. radiative “tails”. It is well known that these fields exhibit a power-law decay, but the precise value of the power-law index has been a matter of some conflict in research literature -- especially in the context of rotating black holes. We are attempting to settle this matter using highly-accurate, long-term and precise numerical evolutions. Here is a log-log plot that shows radiation from a black hole decaying as time progresses: plot. Note that interestingly there is a clear intermediate-time power-law decay and a distinct late-time decay.


  1. •Black Holes in Loop Quantum Gravity (GK,MB)


  1. It is widely believed that the theory of quantum gravitation will resolve the issue of physical singularities (for example, the infinite density at the moment of the big bang and also in the center of black holes) that plague classical general relativity. This project attempts to investigate this possibility in the context of loop quantum gravity.

  2. •Einstein@Home (GK)


  1. Einstein@Home is a program that uses your computer's idle time to search for spinning neutron stars (also called pulsars) using data from the LIGO and GEO gravitational wave detectors. We assist in the optimization of this software for high-performance computing hardware such as the GPU and Cell BE architectures. Check out our Einstein@UMass team!

 
Black Hole Physics