Spotlight

Curran Muhlberger

Curran Muhlberger is a graduate student working in professor Saul
Teukolsky’s research group, “Simulating eXtreme Spacetimes.” The group is a collaboration between Caltech and Cornell with the goal of using supercomputers to study the relativistic physics of black holes and neutron stars. Curran has written software to generate initial data for systems of binary neutron stars by solving both Einstein’s constraint equations and the relativistic hydrodynamics equations under the assumption of circular orbits. In addition to seeding future simulations of merging neutron stars, these “quasi-equilibrium sequences” provide their own insight into the inspiral of compact astrophysical objects.

In the near future, simulations such as these will aid the data analysis
for gravitational wave detectors like LIGO and LISA, opening up a whole new observational window on our universe. Looking at neutron stars in particular, however, allows scientists to probe physics at the smallest scales as well. By constructing stars using a variety of equations of state, Curran and his collaborators hope to help reveal the behavior of nuclear matter at extreme densities inaccessible by any laboratory on Earth.

  • Contact

    Department of Physics Cornell University 109 Clark Hall Ithaca, New York 14853-2501 Phone: (607) 255-6016 Fax: (607) 255-2643 General email: physics@cornell.edu

    Laboratory of Atomic and Solid-State Physics (LASSP) 511 Clark Hall Ithaca, New York 14853-2501 Phone: (607) 255-6053 Fax: (607) 255-6428

    Laboratory for Elementary-Particle Physics (LEPP) Newman Laboratory Cornell University Ithaca, New York 14853-2501 Phone: (607) 255-4951 Fax: (607) 254-4552