Steven A. Balbus
Steven Andrew Balbus (born November 23, 1953 in Philadelphia ) is an American astrophysicist .
Life
Balbus graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with bachelor's degrees in math and physics in 1975 and received his PhD in physics from Caltech in 1981. As a post-doctoral student he was at MIT and Princeton and from 1985 he was at the University of Virginia , where he was assistant professor in 1987 and professor of astronomy in 1997. He was a professor at the École normal supérieure in Paris for nine years before becoming Savillian Professor of Astronomy at Oxford University in 2012 .
He dealt with gas dynamics in astrophysics, especially magnetized gases with applications on accretion disks and the interior of the sun.
With John F. Hawley in 1991 he developed the theory of magnetorotational instability (MRI) or Balbus-Hawley instability from the basic equations of magnetohydrodynamics . It is important for accretion disks in astrophysics, where it helps explain the formation of stars and black holes.
In 2013 he received the Shaw Prize in Astronomy with Hawley . In 2015 he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences and in 2016 a member of the Royal Society . For 2020, Balbus was awarded the Eddington Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society .
Fonts
- Balbus, Hawley Instability, turbulence, and enhanced transport in accretion disks , Reviews of Modern Physics, Volume 70, 1998, pp. 1-53
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Career data based on American Men and Women of Science , Thomson Gale 2004
- ^ Balbus, Hawley A powerful local shear instability in weakly magnetized disks. I - linear analysis. II - Nonlinear evolution , Astrophysical Journal 376, 1991, 214-233
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Balbus, Steven A. |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Balbus, Steven Andrew (full name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American astrophysicist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | November 23, 1953 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Philadelphia |