Biography:Fabio Pacucci

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Short description: Italian theoretical astrophysicist and science educator
Fabio Pacucci
Portrait of astrophysicist Fabio Pacucci.png
Born
Apulia, Italy
Alma materScuola Normale Superiore (Italy)
Awards
  • Clay Fellowship (2019)
  • International Astronomical Union Ph.D. Prize (2017)
  • Livio Gratton Prize (2017)
  • Enrico Persico Prize (2012)
Scientific career
FieldsAstrophysics, astronomy
  • Black holes
  • Quasars
  • High-redshift galaxies
  • Dark matter
  • Structure formation
Institutions
  • Harvard University
  • Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory
  • Kapteyn Astronomical Institute
  • Yale University
  • Scuola Normale Superiore
Websitewww.fabiopacucci.com

Fabio Pacucci is an Italian theoretical astrophysicist and science educator, currently at Harvard University and at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory.[1][2] He is widely known for his contributions to the study of black holes, in particular the first population of black holes formed in the Universe and high redshift quasars.[3][4] He discovered the only two candidate direct collapse black holes known so far,[5][6] and he was in the team that discovered the farthest lensed quasar known.[7][8][9] Pacucci is also a science educator, engaged in public talks on astronomy and science in general.[10] Since 2018 he is a collaborator of TED in developing educational videos about science. The four videos released so far were watched by millions of people worldwide and translated into 25 languages.[11]

Education and career

Fabio Pacucci was born in 1988 in Apulia, a region in the southern part of Italy.[12] He received his B.Sc. in Physics and his M.Sc. in Astronomy and Astrophysics at the Sapienza University of Rome, and his Ph.D. in Physics in 2016 at the Scuola Normale Superiore in Pisa (Italy). He then moved to Yale University in the United States as a postdoctoral researcher, before spending some time as a NOVA Fellow at the Kapteyn Astronomical Institute (Netherlands). He is currently the Clay and BHI Fellow at the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian.[13]

Prizes and fellowships

Fabio Pacucci received several prizes for his work on black holes, including:

  • 2019: Clay Fellowship at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory[1]
  • 2017: “IAU Ph.D.” Prize – International Astronomical Union prize for his Ph.D. Thesis[14]
  • 2017: “Livio Gratton” Prize – Prize for the best Ph.D. thesis in astronomy in Italy (period 2014-2016)[15]
  • 2012: “Enrico Persico” Prize – Prize from the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei[13]

Scientific contributions

Fabio Pacucci is known for his contributions to theoretical astrophysics, specifically to the study of black holes and the early Universe. He also published some papers on the study of dark matter[16] and on planetary dynamics.[17] His main field of study is the formation, growth and observational properties of the first population of black holes formed in the Universe. In 2015 he developed the first code to accurately predict the observational properties of high redshift black hole seeds, named GEMS (Growth of Early Massive Seeds).[18][19] With this tool, he led the team that discovered the first, and thus far only, direct collapse black hole candidates, using data from the Hubble Space Telescope, the Chandra X-ray Observatory and the Spitzer Space Telescope.[5] In 2019 he participated in the discovery of the first strongly lensed quasar in the epoch of reionization, also known as “the brightest quasar in the Universe”,[20] led by Xiaohui Fan.[7] Pacucci described the theoretical consequences of this detection, and the possibility of an undetected population of quasars, in a study with Avi Loeb.[21]

Science education

Fabio Pacucci is also active in the field of science education and outreach, where his most notable long-term collaboration is with TED. He acted as educator for four educational videos on topics ranging from black holes, to Hawking radiation to the three-body problem.[22][23][24] These videos were watched by millions of people around the world and translated into 25 languages.[11] In an interview with the Harvard Gazette, Pacucci commented “By explaining, I understand better. Sometimes simple ideas are not so simple, and they spark new solutions for old problems.”[11]

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 "Fabio Pacucci" (in en). https://bhi.fas.harvard.edu/people/fabio-pacucci. 
  2. ↑ "Fabio Pacucci - Harvard University & Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory" (in en-US). https://www.fabiopacucci.com/. 
  3. ↑ Northon, Karen (2016-05-24). "NASA Telescopes Find Clues For How Giant Black Holes Formed So Quickly". http://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-telescopes-find-clues-for-how-giant-black-holes-formed-so-quickly. 
  4. ↑ "Mystery of supermassive black holes might be solved" (in en-US). https://www.cbsnews.com/news/mystery-of-supermassive-black-holes-might-be-solved/. 
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 Pacucci, Fabio; Ferrara, Andrea; Grazian, Andrea; Fiore, Fabrizio; Giallongo, Emanuele; Puccetti, Simonetta (2016-06-01). "First identification of direct collapse black hole candidates in the early Universe in CANDELS/GOODS-S". Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 459: 1432–1439. doi:10.1093/mnras/stw725. http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2016MNRAS.459.1432P. 
  6. ↑ "Chandra Press Room :: NASA Telescopes Find Clues For How Giant Black Holes Formed So Quickly :: 24 May 16". https://chandra.si.edu/press/16_releases/press_052416.html. 
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 Fan, Xiaohui; Wang, Feige; Yang, Jinyi; Keeton, Charles R.; Yue, Minghao; Zabludoff, Ann; Bian, Fuyan; Bonaglia, Marco et al. (2019-01-01). "The Discovery of a Gravitationally Lensed Quasar at z = 6.51". The Astrophysical Journal Letters 870: L11. doi:10.3847/2041-8213/aaeffe. http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2019ApJ...870L..11F. 
  8. ↑ Shelton, Jim (2019-01-09). "Astronomers uncover the brightest quasar in the early universe" (in en). https://news.yale.edu/2019/01/09/astronomers-uncover-brightest-quasar-early-universe. 
  9. ↑ Rice, Doyle. "Light from dawn of time discovered" (in en-US). https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2019/01/09/quasar-discovered-emitted-light-dawn-time/2529071002/. 
  10. ↑ "Outreach: Astronomy, Cosmology, Space Exploration" (in en-US). https://www.fabiopacucci.com/impact/outreach/. 
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 11.2 "Astrophysicist works to make science understandable" (in en-US). 2020-01-28. https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2020/01/astrophysicist-works-to-make-science-understandable/. 
  12. ↑ "Fabio Pacucci, dalla Puglia a Yale con gli antenati dei buchi neri" (in it-IT). http://www.lavocedinewyork.com/people/nuovo-mondo/2017/05/12/fabio-pacucci-dalla-puglia-a-yale-con-gli-antenati-dei-buchi-neri/. 
  13. ↑ 13.0 13.1 "Curriculum Vitae - Fabio Pacucci (Harvard University & SAO)" (in en-US). https://www.fabiopacucci.com/about-me/curriculum-vitae/. 
  14. ↑ "International Astronomical Union | IAU". https://www.iau.org/news/announcements/detail/ann17024/. 
  15. ↑ "Pacucci awarded Livio Gratton prize | Department of Astronomy". https://astronomy.yale.edu/news/pacucci-awarded-livio-gratton-prize. 
  16. ↑ Pacucci, Fabio; Mesinger, Andrei; Haiman, Zoltán (2013-08-01). "Focusing on warm dark matter with lensed high-redshift galaxies". Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 435: L53–L57. doi:10.1093/mnrasl/slt093. http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2013MNRAS.435L..53P. 
  17. ↑ Pacucci, Fabio; Ferrara, Andrea; D'Onghia, Elena (2013-12-01). "Detectability of Free Floating Planets in Open Clusters with the James Webb Space Telescope". The Astrophysical Journal Letters 778: L42. doi:10.1088/2041-8205/778/2/L42. http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2013ApJ...778L..42P. 
  18. ↑ "GEMS: the code - Fabio Pacucci (Harvard University & SAO)" (in en-US). https://www.fabiopacucci.com/resources/gems-the-code/. 
  19. ↑ Pacucci, Fabio; Ferrara, Andrea; Volonteri, Marta; Dubus, Guillaume (2015-12-01). "Shining in the dark: the spectral evolution of the first black holes". Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 454: 3771–3777. doi:10.1093/mnras/stv2196. http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2015MNRAS.454.3771P. 
  20. ↑ January 2019, Sarah Lewin 11. "The Brightest Quasar of the Early Universe Shines with the Light of 600 Trillion Suns" (in en). https://www.space.com/42962-brightest-quasar-early-universe-600-trillion-suns.html. 
  21. ↑ Pacucci, Fabio; Loeb, Abraham (2019-01-01). "Most Lensed Quasars at z > 6 are Missed by Current Surveys". The Astrophysical Journal Letters 870: L12. doi:10.3847/2041-8213/aaf86a. http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2019ApJ...870L..12P. 
  22. ↑ "My TED-Ed videos" (in en-US). https://www.fabiopacucci.com/impact/outreach/ted-ed-black-hole/. 
  23. ↑ Pacucci, Fabio (in en), Hawking's black hole paradox explained, https://www.ted.com/talks/fabio_pacucci_hawking_s_black_hole_paradox_explained, retrieved 2020-10-18 
  24. ↑ "A millimetre makes a world of difference when calculating planetary trajectories | Aeon Videos" (in en). https://aeon.co/videos/a-millimetre-makes-a-world-of-difference-when-calculating-planetary-trajectories. 

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