The Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian

The Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian

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Gerrit Schellenberger

Center for Astrophysics

Astrophysicist

Gerrit Schellenberger

gerrit.schellenberger@cfa.harvard.edu

About

Gerrit Schellenberger is an astrophysicist and the Chandra High Resolution Camera (HRC) Project Scientist. His research focuses on galaxy clusters, which are the largest gravitationally bound objects in the universe, and serve as laboratories for cosmic structure formation. Dr. Schellenberger's work spans a wide range of topics, including AGN feedback processes, and the properties of the hot intracluster gas. Among his notable contributions are the discovery of one of the longest X-ray tails of a galaxy ever observed, and the detection of the X-ray counterpart to the highest redshift protocluster currently known, which formed surprisingly early in the universe.

PhD in Astrophysics, Bonn University (2016) - M.Sc. in Astrophysics, Bonn University (2012) - B.Sc. in Physics, Bonn University (2010)

Telescopes and Instruments

Chandra

The Chandra X-ray Observatory is NASA’s flagship X-ray observatory, providing essential data on everything from the environment surrounding newborn stars to the emissions from hot plasma inside galaxy clusters. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO), as part of the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian, manages Chandra’s day-to-day operations, providing spacecraft control, observation planning, and data processing for astronomers. Chandra is one of NASA’s orbiting Great Observatories, along with the Hubble.Visit the Chandra Website

Lynx X-Ray Observatory

The Lynx X-ray Observatory is a proposed X-ray space telescope, designed to be the next generation following NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and the European Space Agency’s upcoming Athena Telescope. This observatory will be able to take images of a larger area of the sky in X-ray light with better resolution than any existing telescope, allowing astronomers to study the first supermassive black holes, the hot gas surrounding galaxies as they evolve, and radiation from the earliest stars. Researchers from the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian and other universities are presenting Lynx to NASA for consideration in the 2020 Decadal Survey, with a proposed launch date in the mid-2030s.

Visit the Lynx X-Ray Observatory Website

The Submillimeter Array - Maunakea, HI

Located near the summit of Maunakea on the Big Island of Hawaii, the Submillimeter Array (SMA) is one of the flagship observatories of the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian. The observatory consists of eight radio dishes working together as one telescope, giving astronomers a window on a wide range of astronomical objects and phenomena: planets and comets in our own Solar System; the birth of stars and planets; and the supermassive black holes hidden at the centers of the Milky Way and other galaxies. The SMA is operated jointly by the CfA and the Academia Sinica in Taiwan.

Visit the Submillimeter Array Website