Reinhard Genzel on Galaxies and Massive Black Holes
Nobel Prize laureate Prof. Reinhard Genzel visited Prague. As a guest of the Learned Society of the Czech Republic and the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics of Charles University, he gave two public lectures and took part on a public discussion.
Prof. Reinhard Genzel (photo by Tomáš Rubín)
German astrophysicist Reinhard Genzel is co-director of the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics, professor at the LMU Munich and professor emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley. For the discovery of a supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2020, which he shares with Andrea Ghez and Roger Penrose.
The public program of the Nobelist's visit was spread over two days. On Thursday, August 20, there was first a discussion on infrared astronomy, astronomical instruments, stars orbiting Sgr A* and general relativity. Bolzano's lecture on the gradual discovery of the existence of a massive black hole at the center of our galaxy followed.
Friday's lecture at the Matfyz campus in Troja then addressed the advancement of our knowledge of the evolution of galaxies and the evidence of the existence of massive black holes at galactic centers, which shows a remarkable story of the "co-evolution" of galaxies and massive black holes.
