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Ehud Nakar | Israel Institute for Advanced Studies

Ehud Nakar

Ehud Nakar
Ehud
Nakar
Tel Aviv University
Astrophysics

Ehud Nakar is the incumbent of the Jack Adler Chair of Extragalactic Astronomy at Tel Aviv University's School of Physics and Astronomy. He received his PhD in physics at The Hebrew University in 2004. Following four years as a senior research fellow at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), Nakar joined the faculty of Tel Aviv University.

Prof. Nakar’s research addresses the theory of high-energy astrophysics. He studies the physics of the most extreme environments in the Universe, where flows of matter and energy move at speeds close to the speed of light. His current research focuses on the coalescence of two neutron stars. The first such coalescence was recently detected through gravitational waves and electromagnetic emission. The combination of these signals carries information about the nature of gravity, the evolution of the Universe, and the origin of heavy elements found on Earth (gold, silver and many others). His work has contributed to the understanding of the physical processes that take place during such mergers.

Prof. Nakar is an alumnus of the Israeli Young Academy. He has received numerous grants and awards, including the European Union Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship for doctoral students, the Israeli Physical Society Prize for a Young Physicist, and two European Research Council (ERC) grants.