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Vahe PETROSIAN (b. 1938) |
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Vahe Petrosian, Professor of
Physics and Applied Physics at Stanford University is
one of the outstanding Armenian-American astronomers.
He was born on September 3, 1938. He studied physics
and astrophysics at the Cornell University in 1958-1962 (B.E.E.) and 1962-63
(M.S., thesis adviser Prof. Marshall
Cohen). In 1963-67, he finished his Ph.D. studies under the supervision of
Prof. Edwin Salpeter and defended his Ph.D. thesis.
Prof. Petrosian’s professional experience started in
1961: he was a Teaching Assistant at Cornell University (1961), Research
Assistant, CRSR, Cornell Univ. (1962-67), Research Assoc, CRSR,
Cornell Univ. (1967), Research Fellow, Calif. Inst. Technology (1967-69),
Visiting Scientist, IOTA Cambridge (1969), Assistant Professor, Stanford Univ.
(1969-71), Consultant, Kitt Peak Natl
Observatory (1971), Associate Professor, Stanford Univ. (1972-79), Professor,
Stanford University (since 1980), work at Arcetri, Florence; NOAO, Tucson,AZ; Nordita, Copenhagen;
Cornell Univ. (1982-83), at Observatoire de Meudon,
France (1989-90), at Space Telescope
Science Institute (1996), at NOAO, Tucson, AZ (1998), and at Inst. Adv.
Studies; Bochum Univ. (2000).
Prof. Petrosian’s main fields of scientific interests are
theoretical astrophysics with concentration on high energy astrophysical
processes in solar and stellar flares, gamma-ray bursts, accretion disks of
stellar and active galactic black holes and clusters of galaxies, and in
cosmology; early phase of the universe, the evolution of galaxies and quasars,
arcs in clusters of galaxies, and gravitational lensing.
His research interests have been in two broad areas of high energy astrophysics
and cosmology. The former area includes studies of acceleration, transport and
radiation of non-thermal particles, developed primarily for application to
solar flares. This works has also found application in variety of other
astrophysical sources including accretion disks, Gamma-ray bursts and Clusters
of Galaxies. The work in cosmology is focused on evolution of galaxies and
quasars (and AGNs in general), and in luminous arcs in clusters of galaxies (of
which he is a co-discoverer: R. Lynds & V.
Petrosian, 1989, "Luminous Arcs in
Clusters of Galaxies", ApJ, 336) and
gravitational lensing. Another interest has been in
the area of statistical methods relevant to analysis of astronomical data. This
work is carried out in collaboration with B. Efron of
the Statistics Department at Stanford has been concentrated on development of
new non-parametric methods for determination of distribution of astronomical
sources from truncated data.
Prof. Petrosian has published more than 250 scientific papers on several
subjects, including Gamma-Ray Burst
(>40 publications), quasars and AGN (>20), Solar flares (>70),
statistical methods (>15), and others (>100). He had more than 30 thesis
undergraduate and graduate students and 7 postdoctoral associates since 1973.
Prof. Petrosian was awarded the Iranian National Fellowship (1958-62), the
Industrial Fellowship, Cornell University (1963-64), and Alfred P. Sloan
Foundation Fellowship (1972-74). He is a member of the Royal Astronomical
Society (RAS), International Astronomical Union (IAU), American Astronomical
Society (AAS), Eta Kappa Nu, and Tau Beta Pi. He
joined the Armenian Astronomical Society in April 2007.