Contributors to general relativity
Encyclopedia


This is a partial list of persons who have made major contributions to the development of standard mainstream general relativity
General relativity
General relativity or the general theory of relativity is the geometric theory of gravitation published by Albert Einstein in 1916. It is the current description of gravitation in modern physics...

. One simple rule of thumb for who belongs here is whether their contribution is recognized in the canon of standard general relativity textbooks. Some related lists are mentioned at the bottom of the page.

A

  • Peter C. Aichelburg
    Peter C. Aichelburg
    Peter C. Aichelburg is an Austrian physicist well-known for his contributions to general relativity, particularly the Aichelburg-Sexl ultraboost of the Schwarzschild vacuum....

     (Aichelburg/Sexl ultraboost, generalized symmetries),
  • Miguel Alcubierre
    Miguel Alcubierre
    Miguel Alcubierre Moya is a Mexican theoretical physicist. Born in Mexico City, he obtained a degree in physics, and a Master of Science in theoretical physics at the School of Science of Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México ....

     (numerical relativity
    Numerical relativity
    Numerical relativity is one of the branches of general relativity that uses numerical methods and algorithms to solve and analyze problems. To this end, supercomputers are often employed to study black holes, gravitational waves, neutron stars and many other phenomena governed by Einstein's Theory...

    , warp drives
    Alcubierre drive
    The Alcubierre drive, also known as the Alcubierre metric, is a speculative, but valid solution of the Einstein field equations. It is a mathematical model of a spacetime exhibiting features reminiscent of the fictional "warp drive" from Star Trek, which can travel "faster than light", although...

    ),
  • J. A. Allnut (Alnutt fluid solution),
  • Jan E. Åman (Cartan/Karlhede classification, CLASSI GR computer algebra package),
  • Richard L. Arnowitt
    Richard Arnowitt
    Richard Lewis Arnowitt is an American physicist known for his contributions to theoretical particle physics and to general relativity.Arnowitt is a Distinguished Professor at Texas A&M University, where he is a member of the Department of Physics....

     (ADM formalism
    ADM formalism
    The ADM Formalism developed in 1959 by Richard Arnowitt, Stanley Deser and Charles W. Misner is a Hamiltonian formulation of general relativity...

    , ADM mass/energy),
  • Abhay Ashtekar
    Abhay Ashtekar
    Abhay Vasant Ashtekar is an Indian theoretical physicist. He is the Eberly Professor of Physics and the Director of the Institute for Gravitational Physics and Geometry at Pennsylvania State University. As the creator of Ashtekar variables, he is one of the founders of loop quantum gravity and its...

     (Ashtekar variables, dynamical horizons),
  • Asghar Qadir (Relativity, Astrophysics) Pakistan

B

  • Robert M L Baker, Jr.
    Robert M L Baker, Jr.
    Robert M. L. Baker, Jr. earned a bachelor's degree in physics at UCLA summa cum laude, was elected to Phi Beta Kappa, and earned a master's degree in Physics and a Ph.D. in engineering at UCLA. The Ph.D. in engineering, with a specialization in aerospace, was, according to UCLA officials, the...

     (high-frequency gravitational waves),
  • O. R. Baldwin (Baldwin/Jeffery plane wave),
  • James M. Bardeen
    James M. Bardeen
    James Maxwell Bardeen is an American physicist, well known for his work in general relativity, particularly his role in formulating the laws of black hole mechanics. He also discovered the Bardeen vacuum, an exact solution of the Einstein field equation.Bardeen graduated from Harvard in 1960 and...

     (Bardeen vacuum, black hole mechanics, gauge-invariant linear perturbations of Friedmann-Lemaître cosmologies),
  • Robert Bartnik
    Robert Bartnik
    Robert Bartnik is an Australian mathematician based at Monash University, where he holds the position of Professor of Pure Mathematics. He is known for his contribution to general relativity, particularly for demonstrating that the ADM mass of an asymptotically flat spacetime is a well-defined...

     (existence of ADM mass for asymptotically flat vacuums, quasilocal mass),
  • Jacob Bekenstein
    Jacob Bekenstein
    Jacob David Bekenstein is an Israeli theoretical physicist who has contributed to the foundation of black hole thermodynamics and to other aspects of the connections between information and gravitation.-Biography:...

     (black hole entropy),
  • Lluis Bel (second ell is not a typo, aka Louis Bel; Bel decomposition, Bel–Robinson tensor),
  • Vladimir A. Belinsky (BKL conjecture, inverse scattering transform solution generating methods),
  • Peter G. Bergmann (Constrained Hamiltonian dynamics),
  • Bruno Bertotti
    Bruno Bertotti
    Bruno Bertotti is an Italian physicist, emeritus professor at the University of Pavia. He was one of the last students of Erwin Schrödinger. Bruno Bertotti is well known for his contributions to general relativity — particularly the Bertotti-Robinson electrovacuum, an exact solution of the Einstein...

     (Bertotti/Robinson electrovacuum),
  • George David Birkhoff
    George David Birkhoff
    -External links:* − from National Academies Press, by Oswald Veblen....

     (Birkhoff's theorem
    Birkhoff's theorem (relativity)
    In general relativity, Birkhoff's theorem states that any spherically symmetric solution of the vacuum field equations must be static and asymptotically flat. This means that the exterior solution must be given by the Schwarzschild metric....

    ),
  • Luc Blanchet (gravitational radiation),
  • Hermann Bondi
    Hermann Bondi
    Sir Hermann Bondi, KCB, FRS was an Anglo-Austrian mathematician and cosmologist. He is best known for developing the steady-state theory of the universe with Fred Hoyle and Thomas Gold as an alternative to the Big Bang theory, but his most lasting legacy will probably be his important...

     (gravitational radiation, Bondi radiation chart, Bondi mass-energy-momentum, LTB dust, maverick models),
  • William B. Bonnor
    William B. Bonnor
    William Bowen Bonnor is a mathematician and gravitation physicist best known for his research into astrophysics, cosmology and general relativity. For most of his academic career he has been a professor of mathematics at the University of London....

     (Bonnor beam
    Bonnor beam
    In general relativity, the Bonnor beam is an exact solution which models an infinitely long, straight beam of light. It is an explicit example of a pp-wave spacetime. It is named after William B...

     solution),
  • Robert H. Boyer (Boyer-Lindquist chart in Kerr vacuum),
  • Hubert Bray (Riemannian Penrose inequality
    Riemannian Penrose inequality
    In mathematical general relativity, the Penrose inequality, first conjectured by Sir Roger Penrose, estimates the mass of a spacetime in terms of the total area of its black holes and is a generalization of the positive mass theorem. The Riemannian Penrose inequality is the most important special...

    ),
  • Hans Adolph Buchdahl (Buchdahl fluid, Buchdahl theorem),
  • Carl H. Brans
    Carl H. Brans
    Carl Henry Brans is an American mathematical physicist best known for his research into the theoretical underpinnings of gravitation elucidated in his most widely publicized work, the Brans–Dicke theory....

     (Brans/Dicke theory),
  • Dieter R. Brill (Brill–Hartle geon, Brill mass, positive energy for axisymmetric spacetimes, Brill chart, extensions),
  • Hans W. Brinkmann (exact gravitational waves, Brinkmann chart
    Brinkmann coordinates
    Brinkmann coordinates are a particular coordinate system for a spacetime belonging to the family of pp-wave metrics. In terms of these coordinates, the metric tensor can be written asds^2 \, = H du^2 + 2 du dv + dx^2 + dy^2...

    ),
  • Claudio Bunster
    Claudio Bunster
    Claudio Bunster Weitzman is a Chilean scientist.Bunster studied Sciences at the University of Chile , Santiago and received his Ph.D in Physics from Princeton University, U.S. in 1973. He remained at the university, at the Institute for Advanced Study and also at the University of Texas, until 1984...

     (BTZ Black hole, Surface terms in Hamiltonian formulation),
  • William L. Burke
    William L. Burke
    William Lionel Burke was an astronomy, astrophysics, and physics professor at UC Santa Cruz. He is also the author of Spacetime, Geometry, Cosmology , and of Applied differential geometry , a text expounding the virtues of differential forms over vector calculus for theoretical physics.Born in...

     (Burke potential, textbook),
  • Lior M. Burko (Black hole interiors, Beetle–Burko scalar),

C

  • J. Carminati (CM invariants),
  • Bernard Carr (self-similarity hypothesis, primordial black holes),
  • Brandon Carter
    Brandon Carter
    Brandon Carter, FRS is an Australian theoretical physicist, best known for his work on the properties of black holes and for being the first to name and employ the anthropic principle in its contemporary form. He is a researcher at the Meudon campus of the Laboratoire Univers et Théories, part of...

     (no-hair theorem, black hole mechanics, variational principle for Ernst vacuums),
  • Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar
    Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar
    Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, FRS ) was an Indian origin American astrophysicist who, with William A. Fowler, won the 1983 Nobel Prize for Physics for key discoveries that led to the currently accepted theory on the later evolutionary stages of massive stars...

     (Chandrasekhar limit
    Chandrasekhar limit
    When a star starts running out of fuel, it usually cools off and collapses into one of three compact forms, depending on its total mass:* a White Dwarf, a big lump of Carbon and Oxygen atoms, almost like one huge molecule...

    , colliding plane waves, quasinormal modes, relativistic stars, monograph),
  • Jean Chazy (Chazy/Curzon vacuum),
  • Matthew W. Choptuik (critical phenomena in gravitational collapse, numerical relativity),
  • Yvonne Choquet-Bruhat
    Yvonne Choquet-Bruhat
    Yvonne Choquet-Bruhat is a French mathematician and physicist. She was the first woman to be elected to the Académie des Sciences Française and is a Grand Officier of the Légion d'honneur....

     (formerly Yvonne Bruhat; initial value formulations),
  • Demetrios Christodoulou
    Demetrios Christodoulou
    Demetrios Christodoulou is a Greek mathematician and physicist, who first became well known for his proof, together with Sergiu Klainerman, of the nonlinear stability of the Minkowski spacetime...

     (naked singularity in LTB dust, stability of Minkowski vacuum),
  • Piotr T. Chruściel (asymptotics of RT vacuums, existence of vacuums admitting no maximal slicing, existence of Taub IX vacuums with nonunique extensions to NUT vacuum region, Cauchy horizon
    Cauchy horizon
    In physics, a Cauchy horizon is a light-like boundary of the domain of validity of a Cauchy problem...

    s in T3-Gowdy vacuums),
  • Christopher J. S. Clarke (textbooks),
  • C-M Claudel / R.P.A.C Newman (Gravitational collapse and cosmic censorship, Photon surface)
  • Alan A. Coley (dynamics of minisuperspace, similarity hypothesis),
  • Justin Corvino (construction of initial data not admitting conformal geometry approach, gravitational shielding),
  • Alejandro Corichi
    Alejandro Corichi
    Alejandro Corichi is a theoretical physicist working at the Quantum Gravity group of the National Autonomous University of Mexico . He obtained his bachelor degree at UNAM and his PhD at Pennsylvania State University ....

     (Fundamental contributions to quantum gravity and quantum loop gravity),
  • H. E. J. Curzon (Chazy/Curzon vacuum),

D

  • Thibault Damour
    Thibault Damour
    Thibault Damour is a French physicist.He is a professor of theoretical physics at the Institut des Hautes Études Scientifiques since 1989....

     (gravitational radiation)
  • Georges Darmois
    Georges Darmois
    Georges Darmois was a French mathematician and statistician. He pioneered in the theory of sufficiency, in stellar statistics, and in factor analysis...

     (matching conditions, Darmois vacuum),
  • R. Debever (type D vacuum solutions),
  • Marek Demianski (type D vacuum solutions),
  • Stanley Deser
    Stanley Deser
    Stanley Deser is an American physicist known for his contributions to general relativity. Currently, he is the Ancell Professor of Physics at Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachusetts....

     (ADM initial value formulation, effective field theory),
  • Steven Detweiler (quasinormal modes),
  • Bryce DeWitt
    Bryce DeWitt
    Bryce Seligman DeWitt was a theoretical physicist renowned for advancing gravity and field theories.-Biography:...

     (Wheeler/DeWitt equation),
  • Robert H. Dicke
    Robert H. Dicke
    Robert Henry Dicke was an American physicist who made important contributions to the fields of astrophysics, atomic physics, cosmology and gravity.-Biography:...

     (Brans/Dicke theory, PPN formalism, background radiation),
  • Ray d'Inverno (textbook),
  • Paul A.M. Dirac (graviton),
  • W. G. Dixon (Dixon–Papapetrou equations),
  • Tevian Dray
    Tevian Dray
    Tevian Dray is an American mathematicianwho has worked in general relativity, mathematical physics,Geometry, science and mathematical education.He has primarily worked in the area of classical general relativity...

     (asymptotic structure, gravitational shock waves)
  • R. W. Drever (gravitational wave detectors),

E

  • Arthur Stanley Eddington
    Arthur Stanley Eddington
    Sir Arthur Stanley Eddington, OM, FRS was a British astrophysicist of the early 20th century. He was also a philosopher of science and a popularizer of science...

     (early book, Eddington chart on Schwarzschild vacuum, role of curvature, PPN formalism, popularizations of general relativity),
  • Jürgen Ehlers
    Jürgen Ehlers
    Jürgen Ehlers was a German physicist who made notable contributions to the current understanding of Albert Einstein's theory of general relativity...

     (Ehlers vacuum family, symmetries of PP waves, spacetime view of gravitational lensing, Newtonian limit),
  • Albert Einstein
    Albert Einstein
    Albert Einstein was a German-born theoretical physicist who developed the theory of general relativity, effecting a revolution in physics. For this achievement, Einstein is often regarded as the father of modern physics and one of the most prolific intellects in human history...

     (the creator of general relativity, with various contributions too important to attempt to summarize here),
  • George F. R. Ellis (relativistic cosmological models, classification of curvature singularities, averaging problem in cosmology, gauge-invariant linear perturbations of spatially homogeneous cosmologies, "small universes", monograph, Virbhadra–Ellis lens equation),
  • Roberto Emparan (black rings)
  • G. Erez (Erez/Rosen vacuum),
  • Frederick J. Ernst (Ernst vacuum family, Ernst equation
    Ernst equation
    In mathematics, the Ernst equation is the non-linear partial differential equation\displaystyle \Re = ^2+^2.It is used to produce exact solutions of Einstein's equations....

    , solution generating methods, Ernst/Wild electrovacuum),
  • Loránd Eötvös
    Loránd Eötvös
    Baron Loránd Eötvös de Vásárosnamény , more commonly called Baron Roland von Eötvös in English literature, was a Hungarian physicist. He is remembered today largely for his work on gravitation and surface tension.-Life:...

     (Weak Equivalence Principle experiment),
  • Frank B. Estabrook (hyperbolic formulations of the EFE),

F

  • David L. Farnsworth (use of Lie groups in relativity, Kerr/Farnsworth ansatz),
  • Valeria Ferrari (Chandrasekhar/Ferrari colliding plane wave, Ferrari/Ibañez colliding plane wave, relativistic stars),
  • Alexander Feinstein (Inhomogeneous Cosmologies, Gravitational Solitons, Colliding Plane Waves, Tachyonic Inflation),
  • Richard Feynman
    Richard Feynman
    Richard Phillips Feynman was an American physicist known for his work in the path integral formulation of quantum mechanics, the theory of quantum electrodynamics and the physics of the superfluidity of supercooled liquid helium, as well as in particle physics...

     (sticky bead argument
    Sticky bead argument
    In general relativity, the sticky bead argument is a simple thought experiment designed to show that gravitational radiation is indeed predicted by general relativity, and can have physical effects...

     [as 'Mr. Smith']),
  • David Finkelstein
    David Finkelstein
    David Ritz Finkelstein is currently an emeritus professor of physics at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Finkelstein obtained his Ph.D. in physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1953. From 1964 to 1976, he was professor of physics at Yeshiva University.In 1958 Charles W...

     (rediscovered Eddington chart on Schwarzschild vacuum),
  • Helmut Friedrich (nonlinear global stability of de Sitter spacetime, peeling behavior is generic under small global nonlinear perturbations of Minkowksi spacetime, symmetric hyperbolic formulations of Einstein's field equations),
  • Vladimir Aleksandrovich Fock (textbook, harmonic chart),
  • Gyula Fodor (Fodor method for generating static spherically symmetric perfect fluid solutions),
  • Robert L. Forward (gravitational wave detectors),
  • William A. Fowler (relativistic stellar models, gravitational collapse),
  • Alexander Alexandrovich Friedman
    Alexander Alexandrovich Friedman
    Alexander Alexandrovich Friedman or Friedmann was a Russian and Soviet physicist and mathematician.- Life and work :...

     (Aleksandr Friedman; Friedman cosmological models),
  • John L. Friedman (topological censorship),
  • C. Frønsdal (global structure of Schwarzschild vacuum),

G

  • Robert P. Geroch (Geroch group
    Geroch group
    The Geroch group is an inifinite-dimensional symmetry group of axisymmetric, stationary vacuum spacetimes that are solutions of Einstein's equations of general relativity. It is generated by two non-commuting subgroups: the Matznerg–Misner group The Geroch group is an inifinite-dimensional...

    , singularity theorems, GHP formalism
    GHP formalism
    The GHP formalism is a technique used in the mathematics of general relativity that involves singling out a pair of null directions at each point of spacetime....

    ),
  • Kurt Gödel
    Kurt Gödel
    Kurt Friedrich Gödel was an Austrian logician, mathematician and philosopher. Later in his life he emigrated to the United States to escape the effects of World War II. One of the most significant logicians of all time, Gödel made an immense impact upon scientific and philosophical thinking in the...

     (Gödel dust solution, closed timelike curve
    Closed timelike curve
    In mathematical physics, a closed timelike curve is a worldline in a Lorentzian manifold, of a material particle in spacetime that is "closed," returning to its starting point...

    s),
  • Robert H. Gowdy (Gowdy solution
    Gowdy solution
    Gowdy universes or, alternatively, Gowdy solutions of Einstein's equations are simple model spacetimes in general relativity which represent an expanding universe filled with a regular pattern of gravitational waves....

    s),
  • Jerry B. Griffiths (colliding plane waves),

H

  • Richard O. Hansen (Geroch–Hansen stationary relativistic multipole moments, Ashtekar–Hansen conformal completion),
  • B. Kent Harrison (gravitational collapse
    Gravitational collapse
    Gravitational collapse is the inward fall of a body due to the influence of its own gravity. In any stable body, this gravitational force is counterbalanced by the internal pressure of the body, in the opposite direction to the force of gravity...

    , solution generating methods),
  • James Hartle
    James Hartle
    James Burkett Hartle is an American physicist. He has been a professor of physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara since 1966, and he is currently a member of the external faculty of the Santa Fe Institute...

     (quantum cosmology
    Quantum cosmology
    In theoretical physics, quantum cosmology is a field attempting to study the effect of quantum mechanics on the formation of the universe, or its early evolution, especially just after the Big Bang...

    , textbook),
  • Stephen W. Hawking (singularity theorems, Hawking radiation
    Hawking radiation
    Hawking radiation is a thermal radiation with a black body spectrum predicted to be emitted by black holes due to quantum effects. It is named after the physicist Stephen Hawking, who provided a theoretical argument for its existence in 1974, and sometimes also after the physicist Jacob Bekenstein...

    , monograph),
  • Charles W. Hellaby
    Charles W. Hellaby
    Dr Charles Hellaby is a lecturer at the University of Cape Town, South Africa. He is a member of the . His research interests include:* Inhomogeneous cosmology...

     (cosmological models),
  • David Hilbert
    David Hilbert
    David Hilbert was a German mathematician. He is recognized as one of the most influential and universal mathematicians of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Hilbert discovered and developed a broad range of fundamental ideas in many areas, including invariant theory and the axiomatization of...

     (variational principle),
  • Cornelius Hoenselaers (solution generating methods, monograph)
  • Banesh Hoffmann
    Banesh Hoffmann
    Banesh Hoffmann was a British mathematician and physicist known for his association with Albert Einstein.-Life:Banesh Hoffmann was born in Richmond, England, on 6 September 1906...

     (EIH approximation),
  • Fred Hoyle
    Fred Hoyle
    Sir Fred Hoyle FRS was an English astronomer and mathematician noted primarily for his contribution to the theory of stellar nucleosynthesis and his often controversial stance on other cosmological and scientific matters—in particular his rejection of the "Big Bang" theory, a term originally...

     (maverick models),
  • Russell Hulse (Hulse/Taylor pulsar),

I

  • J. Ibañez (colliding plane wave, solution generating methods, Ferrari/Ibañez colliding plane waves),
  • Leopold Infeld
    Leopold Infeld
    Leopold Infeld was a Polish physicist who worked mainly in Poland and Canada . He was a Rockefeller fellow at Cambridge University and a member of the Polish Academy of Sciences....

     (EIH approximation),
  • Lorenzo Iorio (phenomenology of gravitoelectromagnetism and of modified models of gravity)
  • Richard Isaacson (energy-momentum complex),
  • James A. Isenberg
    James A. Isenberg
    James Isenberg is one of the pioneers in the study of the constraint equations in classical general relativity. His many important contributions include the completion of the solution theory of the constraint equations on closed manifolds with constant mean curvature, and with his collaborators,...

     (initial value formulations, gluing construction),
  • J. M. Islam (monograph),
  • Werner Israel
    Werner Israel
    Werner Israel, OC, FRSC, FRS is a Canadian physicist.Born in Berlin, Germany and raised in Cape Town, South Africa, he received his B.Sc. in 1951 and his M.Sc. in 1954 from the University of Cape Town. He received his Ph.D...

     (no hair theorem, tidal forces around black hole singularities, black hole interiors and mass inflation),

J

  • Theodore Jacobson
    Theodore Jacobson
    Theodore A. "Ted" Jacobson is an American theoretical physicist. He is known for his work on the connection between gravity and thermodynamics. In particular, in 1995 Jacobson proved that the Einstein field equations describing relativistic gravity can be derived from thermodynamic...

     (thermodynamical derivation of Einstein's field equation),
  • Robert T. Jantzen (streamlined Bianchi classification, gravitoelectromagnetism),
  • Jørg Tofte Jebsen
    Jørg Tofte Jebsen
    Jørg Tofte Jebsen was a Norwegian physicist who discovered and published an important theorem concerning general relativity which is now known as Birkhoff's theorem. This result was rediscovered by George David Birkhoff a few years later....

     (Birkhoff's theorem
    Birkhoff's theorem (relativity)
    In general relativity, Birkhoff's theorem states that any spherically symmetric solution of the vacuum field equations must be static and asymptotically flat. This means that the exterior solution must be given by the Schwarzschild metric....

    ),
  • George Barker Jeffery
    George Barker Jeffery
    George Barker Jeffery was a leading mathematical physicist in the early twentieth century. He is probably best known to the scientifically literate public as the translator of papers by Einstein, Lorentz, and other fathers of relativity theory .-Career:Jeffery was born in 1891 and educated at...

     (Baldwin/Jeffery plane wave),
  • Pascual Jordan
    Pascual Jordan
    -Further reading:...

     (Jordan/Brans/Dicke theory),

K

  • Ronald Kantowski
    Ronald Kantowski
    Ronald Kantowski is a theoretical cosmologist, well known in the field of general relativity as the author, together with Rainer K. Sachs, of the Kantowski/Sachs dust solutions to the Einstein field equation. These are a widely used family of inhomogeneous cosmological models.Kantowski received his...

     (Kantowski/Sachs fluids),
  • Anders Karlhede (Cartan–Karlhede classification),
  • Edward Kasner
    Edward Kasner
    Edward Kasner who studied under Cassius Jackson Keyser, was a prominent American mathematician who was appointed Tutor on Mathematics in the Columbia University Mathematics Department...

     (Kasner dust solution),
  • Roy Patrick Kerr
    Roy Kerr
    Roy Patrick Kerr CNZM is a New Zealand mathematician who is best known for discovering the Kerr vacuum, an exact solution to the Einstein field equation of general relativity...

     (Kerr vacuum, Kerr/Schild metrics, use of Lie groups in relativity, Kerr/Farnsworth ansatz),
  • Isaak Markovich Khalatnikov
    Isaak Markovich Khalatnikov
    Isaak Markovich Khalatnikov is a leading Soviet physicist, well known for his role in developing the BKL conjecture in general relativity.Khalatnikov was born in Dnipropetrovsk and graduated from Dnipropetrovsk State University with a degree in Physics in 1941. He has been a member of the...

     (BKL conjecture),
  • William Morris Kinnersley
    William Morris Kinnersley
    William Morris Kinnersley is an American physicist who is well known for his contributions to general relativity.Kinnersley earned his Ph.D. from Caltech in 1968, under the direction of Kip Thorne...

     (photon rocket),
  • Sergiu Klainerman
    Sergiu Klainerman
    Sergiu Klainerman is a mathematician known for his contributions to the study of hyperbolic differential equations and general relativity. He is a Professor in the Department of Mathematics at Princeton University, a position he held since 1987. From 1980 to 1987 he was a faculty member at New...

     (global stability of Minkowski vacuum),
  • Oskar Klein
    Oskar Klein
    Oskar Benjamin Klein was a Swedish theoretical physicist.Klein was born in Danderyd outside Stockholm, son of the chief rabbi of Stockholm, Dr. Gottlieb Klein from Homonna in Hungary and Antonie Levy...

     (Klein fluid, Kaluza–Klein theories
    Kaluza–Klein theory
    In physics, Kaluza–Klein theory is a model that seeks to unify the two fundamental forces of gravitation and electromagnetism. The theory was first published in 1921. It was proposed by the mathematician Theodor Kaluza who extended general relativity to a five-dimensional spacetime...

    ),
  • Arthur Komar (Komar energy-momentum integrals),
  • Dmitri R. Korotkin (finite-gap solutions, solution generating methods),
  • Dietrich Kramer (solution generating methods, monograph),
  • Andrzej Krasiński (exact solutions),
  • Erich Kretschmann
    Erich Kretschmann
    Erich Justus Kretschmann was a German physicist.He obtained his D.Phil. at Berlin University in 1914 with his dissertation entitled "Eine Theorie der Schwerkraft im Rahmen der ursprünglichen Einsteinschen Relativitätstheorie "...

     (Kretschmann invariant),
  • Martin Kruskal
    Martin Kruskal
    Martin David Kruskal was an American mathematician and physicist. He made fundamental contributions in many areas of mathematics and science, ranging from plasma physics to general relativity and from nonlinear analysis to asymptotic analysis...

     (KS chart for Schwarzschild vacuum),
  • Wolfgang Kundt (EK classification of symmetries of pp waves),

L

  • Cornelius Lanczos
    Cornelius Lanczos
    Cornelius Lanczos Löwy Kornél was a Hungarian-Jewish mathematician and physicist, who was born on February 2, 1893, and died on June 25, 1974....

     (Lanczos tensor
    Lanczos tensor
    There are two different tensors sometimes referred to as the Lanczos tensor :* A tensor in the theory of quadratic Lagrangians, which vanishes in four dimensions....

    , van Stockum dust
    Van Stockum dust
    In general relativity, the van Stockum dust is an exact solution of the Einstein field equation in which the gravitational field is generated by dust rotating about an axis of cylindrical symmetry...

    ),
  • Lev D. Landau (LL complex, textbook),
  • Kayll Lake (GRTensorII, Lake method for generating static spherically symmetric perfect fluids),
  • Georges-Henri Lemaître (cosmological model, LTB dust, Lemaître chart on Schwarzschild vacuum),
  • José P. S. Lemos (Black holes with horizons with toroidal topology),
  • Josef Lense
    Josef Lense
    Josef Lense was an Austrian physicistIn 1914 Lense got his doctorate under Samuel Oppenheim. From 1927-28 he was Professor ordinarius and from 1928-1946 Professor extraordinarius for applied mathematics at the Technical University of Munich...

     (Lense/Thirring precession),
  • Tullio Levi-Civita
    Tullio Levi-Civita
    Tullio Levi-Civita, FRS was an Italian mathematician, most famous for his work on absolute differential calculus and its applications to the theory of relativity, but who also made significant contributions in other areas. He was a pupil of Gregorio Ricci-Curbastro, the inventor of tensor calculus...

     (static vacuums, C-metric; see also related list below),
  • R. M. Lewis (chart for Ernst vacuums),
  • André Lichnerowicz
    André Lichnerowicz
    André Lichnerowicz was a noted French differential geometer and mathematical physicist of Polish descent.-Biography:...

     (3+1 formalism, matching conditions, Lichnerowicz equation),
  • Evgeny M. Lifshitz (Landau–Lifschitz gravitational energy-momentum complex, BKL conjecture, textbook),
  • Alan P. Lightman (problem book),

M

  • Malcolm A. H. MacCallum (non-tilted spatially homogeneous cosmologies, exact solutions book),
  • M. Mathisson (Mathisson–Dixon–Papapetrou equations, Mathisson–Pirnai condition in the Kerr metric),
  • Richard A. Matzner (popularized Penrose picture of gravitational wave, rotating cosmologies),
  • Marc Mars (Mars vacuum),
  • David Maxwell (Yamabe number criterion for existence of asymptotically flat vacuum solutions),
  • R. G. McLenaghan (CM invariants),
  • Reinhard Meinel
    Reinhard Meinel
    Reinhard Meinel is the Head of the Relativistic Astrophysics group at the Institute of Theoretical Physics in Jena, Germany. In 1995 he published together with Gernot Neugebauer a complete analytical solution to the field equations of Einstein's Theory of gravity in the case of a rigidly rotating...

     (Neugebauer/Meinel dust disk solution),
  • M. A. Melvin (Melvin electrovacuum),
  • A.W.K. Metzner (Gravitational waves, Bondi–Metzner–Sachs Group)
  • Hermann Minkowski
    Hermann Minkowski
    Hermann Minkowski was a German mathematician of Ashkenazi Jewish descent, who created and developed the geometry of numbers and who used geometrical methods to solve difficult problems in number theory, mathematical physics, and the theory of relativity.- Life and work :Hermann Minkowski was born...

     (spacetime
    Spacetime
    In physics, spacetime is any mathematical model that combines space and time into a single continuum. Spacetime is usually interpreted with space as being three-dimensional and time playing the role of a fourth dimension that is of a different sort from the spatial dimensions...

    ),
  • Charles W. Misner
    Charles W. Misner
    Charles W. Misner is an American physicist and one of the authors of Gravitation. His specialties include general relativity and cosmology. His work has also provided early foundations for studies of quantum gravity and numerical relativity....

     (mixmaster model, ADM initial value formulation, ADM mass, textbook)
  • John Moffat (various classical gravitation theories)
  • Vincent Moncrief (global properties of spatially compact dynamical vacuum spacetimes),
  • C. Møller (energy-momentum complex),
  • Moustafa Mosharafa
    Moustafa Mosharafa
    Dr. Ali Moustafa Mosharafa Pasha was an Egyptian theoretical physicist. He was professor of applied mathematics in the Faculty of Science at Cairo University, and also served as its first dean...

     (Relation of radiation, mass and energy),

N

  • Hidekazu Nariai (Nariai Lambdavacuum solution),
  • Gernot Neugebauer (Neugebauer/Meinel dust disk solution),
  • Ezra Ted Newman (Newman–Penrose formalism, Kerr–Newman black hole solution, Janis–Newman–Winicour solution, NUT vacuum, RT spacetimes, relation of lensing to Weyl tensor),
  • Wei-Tou Ni
    Wei-Tou Ni
    Ni Wei-Tou is a Taiwanese physicist, who graduated from the Department of Physics of National Taiwan University , and got his PhD of Physics & Mathematics from California Institute of Technology...

     (competing theory),
  • Gunnar Nordström
    Gunnar Nordström
    Gunnar Nordström was a Finnish theoretical physicist best remembered for his theory of gravitation, which was an early competitor of general relativity...

     (competing theory, RN electrovacuum),
  • Kenneth Nordtvedt (Nordtvedt effect
    Nordtvedt effect
    In theoretical astrophysics, the Nordtvedt effect refers to the relative motion between the Earth and the Moon which would be observed if the gravitational self-energy of a body contributed to its gravitational mass but not its inertial mass...

    , PPN formalism, competing theory),
  • Igor D. Novikov (Novikov chart in Schwarschild vacuum, No hair theorem, Accretion disks around black holes, monograph),

O

  • S. O'Brien (O'Brien/Synge matching conditions),
  • Peter O'Donnell
    Peter O'Donnell
    Peter O'Donnell was a British writer of mysteries and of comic strips, best known as the creator of Modesty Blaise, a female action hero/undercover trouble-shooter/enforcer...

     (Lanczos potential theory),
  • Niall Ó Murchadha (initial value formulation, proof of the Penrose inequality in spherical symmetry (with E. Malec), mathematical relativity including analysis of quasi-local mass and the constraint equations),
  • Robert Oppenheimer
    Robert Oppenheimer
    Julius Robert Oppenheimer was an American theoretical physicist and professor of physics at the University of California, Berkeley. Along with Enrico Fermi, he is often called the "father of the atomic bomb" for his role in the Manhattan Project, the World War II project that developed the first...

     (gravitational collapse, OS dust),
  • Amos Ori
    Amos Ori
    Amos Ori is a professor of Physics at the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa, Israel. He received media attention in 2005 when he proposed, in a letter to Physical Review Letters, what he claimed was a more "realistic" model for time travel....

     (black hole interiors, time machines, radiation reaction, gravitational collapse),
  • István Ozsváth (Ozsváth/Schücking plane wave),

P

  • Georgios O. Papadopoulos (Papadopoulos-Xanthopoulos solution),
  • Achilles Papapetrou (chart for Ernst vacuum family, Majumdar-Papapetrou electrovacuums, Dixon-Papapetrou equations),
  • L.K. Patel (Vaidya-Patel solution),
  • Paul Painlevé
    Paul Painlevé
    Paul Painlevé was a French mathematician and politician. He served twice as Prime Minister of the Third Republic: 12 September – 13 November 1917 and 17 April – 22 November 1925.-Early life:Painlevé was born in Paris....

     (Painlevé chart in Schwarzschild vacuum),
  • Roger Penrose
    Roger Penrose
    Sir Roger Penrose OM FRS is an English mathematical physicist and Emeritus Rouse Ball Professor of Mathematics at the Mathematical Institute, University of Oxford and Emeritus Fellow of Wadham College...

     (singularity theorems, conformal compactification and techniques from algebraic geometry, Penrose limits, cosmic censorship hypotheses, Penrose inequalities, geometry of gravitational plane waves, impulsive waves, Penrose/Khan colliding plane wave, Newman/Penrose formalism, twistor theory, Weyl curvature hypothesis, highly influential monograph),
  • Asher Peres
    Asher Peres
    Asher Peres was an Israeli physicist, considered a pioneer in quantum information theory. According to his autobiography, he was born in Beaulieu-sur-Dordogne in France, where his father, a Polish electrical engineer, had found work laying down power lines...

     (gravitational wave maverick),
  • Zoltán Perjés (relavistic multipoles, Ernst vacuums),
  • Volker Perlick (solution methods, strong lensing),
  • Alexei Zinovievich Petrov (A. Z. Petrov or Aleksey Zinovjevitch Petrov; Petrov classification of algebraic properties of Weyl curvatue tensor),
  • Tsvi Piran (gravitational collapse),
  • Felix A. E. Pirani (gravitational radiation, Petrov/Pirani classification of algebraic properties of Weyl curvature tensor),
  • Jerzy F. Plebański
    Jerzy Plebanski
    Jerzy Franciszek Plebański Rosiński was a Polish theoretical physicist best known for his extensive research into general relativity and supergravity.-Sources:*...

     (Plebanski vacuum, Plebanski action
    Plebanski action
    General relativity and supergravity in all dimensions meet each other at a common assumption:Using these assumptions one can construct an effective field theory in low energies for both...

    ),
  • Boris Podolsky
    Boris Podolsky
    Boris Yakovlevich Podolsky , was an American physicist of Russian Jewish descent.-Education:In 1896, Boris Podolsky was born into a poor Jewish family in Taganrog, in what was then the Russian Empire, and he moved to the United States in 1913...

     (EPR paradox),
  • Eric Poisson
    Eric Poisson
    Eric Poisson is a Canadian physicist specializing in the theory of black holes. Poisson is currently a professor at the University of Guelph. Poisson was awarded the 2005 Herzberg Medal, the highest honor awarded by the Canadian Association of Physicists....

     (black hole interiors, mass inflation, monograph),
  • William H. Press
    William H. Press
    William H. Press is an astrophysicist, theoretical physicist, and computational biologist. He is a member of the United States National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Council on Foreign Relations. Other honors include the 1981 Helen B...

     (gravitational wave astronomy, problem book),
  • Richard H. Price
    Richard H. Price
    Richard H. Price is an American physicist specializing in general relativity.Price graduated from Stuyvesant High School in 1960, and went on to earn a dual degree in physics and engineering from Cornell University in 1965. He earned his Ph.D. in 1971 from Caltech under the supervision of Kip...

     (power law decay of perturbations, problem book),

R

  • George Yuri Rainich
    George Yuri Rainich
    George Yuri Rainich was a leading mathematical physicist in the early twentieth century.-Career:Rainich studied mathematics in Odessa and Munich, eventually obtaining his doctorate in 1913 from the University of Kazan...

     (Rainich conditions),
  • A. K. Raychaudhuri (Raychaudhuri equation),
  • István Rácz (spacetime extensions)
  • Tullio Regge
    Tullio Regge
    Tullio Regge is an Italian theoretical physicist. He obtained a degree in physics from the University of Turin in 1952, and a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Rochester in 1957 under the direction of Robert Marshak. From 1958 to 1959 Regge held a post at the Max Planck Institute for...

     (Regge calculus),
  • Hans Reissner
    Hans Reissner
    Hans Jacob Reissner was a German aeronautical engineer whose avocation was mathematical physics. During World War I he was awarded the Iron Cross second class for his pioneering work on aircraft design....

     (RN electrovacuum),
  • Alan D. Rendall (Fuchsian analysis of non-oscillatory spacetime singularities, dynamics of Einstein-Vlasov systems),
  • Wolfgang Rindler
    Wolfgang Rindler
    Wolfgang Rindler is a leading physicist working in the field of General Relativity where he is well known for introducing the term "event horizon", Rindler coordinates, and for popularizing the use of spinors in general relativity. He is also a prolific textbook author.-Education:Rindler gained...

     (Rindler chart for Minkowski vacuum),
  • Hans Ringström (strong cosmic censorship holds for T3-Gowdy vacuums),
  • Mark D. Roberts(exact scalar Einstein solutions),
  • Howard Percy Robertson
    Howard Percy Robertson
    Howard Percy Robertson was an American mathematician and physicist known for contributions related to physical cosmology and the uncertainty principle...

     (role of curvature, PPN formalism, RW metric),
  • Ivor Robinson (Bel/Robinson tensor, Bertotti/Robinson electrovacuum),
  • Nathan Rosen
    Nathan Rosen
    Nathan Rosen was an American-Israeli physicist noted for his study on the structure of the hydrogen molecule and his work with Albert Einstein and Boris Podolsky on entangled wave functions and the EPR paradox.-Background:Nathan Rosen was born into a Jewish family in Brooklyn, New York...

     (gravitational wave maverick, Erez-Rosen solution, EPR paradox, Einstein-Rosen bridge,Einstein-Rosen gravitational waves),
  • Remo Ruffini
    Remo Ruffini
    Remo Ruffini is Professor of Theoretical Physics at the University of Rome "Sapienza", since 1978...

     (particle motion in black holes, textbook),
  • Michael P. Ryan (rotating cosmological models),

S

  • Rainer K. Sachs (peeling theorem, optical scalars, Kantowski/Sachs fluid solutions, Sachs-Wolfe effect, Bondi-Metzner-Sachs group),
  • Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov
    Andrei Sakharov
    Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov was a Soviet nuclear physicist, dissident and human rights activist. He earned renown as the designer of the Soviet Union's Third Idea, a codename for Soviet development of thermonuclear weapons. Sakharov was an advocate of civil liberties and civil reforms in the...

     (vacuum fluctuations),
  • Alfred Schild
    Alfred Schild
    Alfred Schild was a leading American physicist, well-known for his contributions to the Golden age of general relativity ....

     (Kerr/Schild metrics, Schild's ladder),
  • Leonard Isaac Schiff (PPN formalism, textbook),
  • Kristin Schleich (topological censorship, chaos, quantum cosmology),
  • Bernd G. Schmidt (Geroch group, classification of curvature singularities, b-boundary, quasinormal modes),
  • Richard Schoen
    Richard Schoen
    Richard Melvin Schoen is an American mathematician. Born in Fort Recovery, Ohio, he received his PhD in 1977 from Stanford University where he is currently the Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professor of Humanities and Sciences...

     (positive energy theorem, gravitational shielding),
  • Engelbert Schücking
    Engelbert Schücking
    Engelbert Schücking is a physics professor at New York University in New York City. His research interests are theoretical astrophysics, general relativity and cosmology...

     (Ozsváth/Schücking plane wave),
  • Bernard F. Schutz
    Bernard F. Schutz
    Bernard F. Schutz is an American physicist. His research is on Einstein's theory of general relativity, more concretely on the physics of gravitational waves. He is one of the directors and head of the astrophysics group at the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics in Potsdam, Germany...

     (gravitational wave detectors, textbook),
  • Karl Schwarzschild
    Karl Schwarzschild
    Karl Schwarzschild was a German physicist. He is also the father of astrophysicist Martin Schwarzschild.He is best known for providing the first exact solution to the Einstein field equations of general relativity, for the limited case of a single spherical non-rotating mass, which he accomplished...

     (Schwarzscild solution, Schwarzschild radius, Event horizon, Schwarzschild vacuum, Schwarzschild fluid),
  • Dennis William Sciama
    Dennis William Sciama
    Dennis William Siahou Sciama FRS was a British physicist who, through his own work and that of his students, played a major role in developing British physics after the Second World War. He is considered as one of the fathers of modern cosmology.-Life:Sciama was born in Manchester, England...

     (Einstein-Cartan theory, role in legitimizing black hole concept),
  • Jose M. M. Senovilla (Senovilla dust),
  • Irwin I. Shapiro (Shapiro effect, observational tests),
  • Harlow Shapley
    Harlow Shapley
    Harlow Shapley was an American astronomer.-Career:He was born on a farm in Nashville, Missouri, and dropped out of school with only the equivalent of a fifth-grade education...

     (rotating cosmologies),
  • D. H. Sharp (Sharp-Misner mass, quasilocal energy-momentum),
  • Lawrence Shepley (rotating cosmological models),
  • Douglas A. Singleton (asymptotics of RT spacetimes),
  • Willem de Sitter
    Willem de Sitter
    Willem de Sitter was a Dutch mathematician, physicist and astronomer.-Life and work:Born in Sneek, De Sitter studied mathematics at the University of Groningen and then joined the Groningen astronomical laboratory. He worked at the Cape Observatory in South Africa...

     (or deSitter; deSitter Lambdavacuum solution, deSitter precession),
  • Hartland Snyder
    Hartland Snyder
    Hartland Sweet Snyder was a physicist who along with Robert Oppenheimer calculated the gravitational collapse of a pressure-free homogenous fluid sphere, and found that it could not communicate with the rest of the universe....

     (OS collapsing dust model),
  • Hans Stephani (Stephani dust solution, monograph, textbook),
  • John M. Stewart (singularities of wavefronts of gravitational waves, monograph),
  • Willem Jacob van Stockum
    Willem Jacob van Stockum
    Willem Jacob van Stockum was a mathematician who made an important contribution to the early development of general relativity....

     (van Stockum dust),
  • John Lighton Synge
    John Lighton Synge
    John Lighton Synge was an Irish mathematician and physicist.-Background:Synge was born 1897 in Dublin, Ireland, in a Protestant family and educated at St. Andrew's College, Dublin. He entered Trinity College, Dublin in 1915...

     (global structure of Schwarzschild vacuum, world function, O'Brien/Synge matching conditions),
  • László B. Szabados (quasilocal energy-momentum)
  • Peter Szekeres (Szekeres metric, colliding plane waves, Szekeres fluid),

T

  • L. A. Tamburino (NUT vacuum),
  • Abraham Haskel Taub
    Abraham Haskel Taub
    Abraham Haskel Taub was a distinguished American mathematician and physicist, well known for his important contributions to the early development of general relativity, as well as differential geometry and differential equations...

     (Taub plane symmetric vacuum, Taub-NUT vacuum
    Taub-NUT vacuum
    The Taub-NUT vacuum is an exact solution to Einstein's equations, a model universe formulated in the framework of general relativity that is homogeneous but anisotropic. It is based on a solution published by Abraham Haskel Taub in 1951....

    , vacuum solutions foliated by Bianchi manifolds, relativistic hydrodynamics),
  • Joseph Taylor
    Joseph Hooton Taylor, Jr.
    Joseph Hooton Taylor, Jr. is an American astrophysicist and Nobel Prize in Physics laureate for his discovery with Russell Alan Hulse of a "new type of pulsar, a discovery that has opened up new possibilities for the study of gravitation."...

     (Hulse/Taylor pulsar),
  • Saul Teukolsky
    Saul Teukolsky
    Saul Teukolsky is a theoretical astrophysicist and a professor of Physics and Astronomy at Cornell University. His major research interests include general relativity, relativistic astrophysics, and computational astrophysics.-Biography:...

     (master equation for perturbations of Kerr vacuum, problem book),
  • Hans Thirring
    Hans Thirring
    Hans Thirring was an Austrian theoretical physicist, professor, and father of the physicist Walter Thirring....

     (Lense/Thirring precession effect)
  • Kip S. Thorne (relativistic multipoles, hoop conjecture, membrane paradigm, gravitational wave detectors, textbook),
  • Frank J. Tipler
    Frank J. Tipler
    Frank Jennings Tipler is a mathematical physicist and cosmologist, holding a joint appointment in the Departments of Mathematics and Physics at Tulane University. Tipler has authored books and papers on the Omega Point, which he claims is a mechanism for the resurrection of the dead. It has been...

     (classification of curvature singularities)
  • Richard Chase Tolman (Tolman surface brightness test
    Tolman surface brightness test
    The Tolman surface brightness test is one out of a half-dozen cosmological tests that was conceived in the 1930s to check the viability of and compare new cosmological models. Tolman's test compares the surface brightness of galaxies as a function of their redshift . Such a comparison was first...

    , Tolman dust solutions, LTB dust),
  • Andrzej Trautman
    Andrzej Trautman
    Andrzej Mariusz Trautman is a leading mathematical physicist who has made important contributions to classical gravitation in general and to general relativity in particular....

     (RT spacetimes),

U

  • Claes Uggla
    Claes Uggla
    Claes Uggla was a Swedish Admiral of the 17th century.After serving as a soldier in the Thirty Years' War, in 1644 he entered the Navy, and served with distinction against the Dutch in the battle of Øresund in 1658...

     (dynamical systems techniques in relativistic gravitation, exact solutions)
  • William G. Unruh (Unruh radiation),
  • T. Unti (NUT vacuum),

V


W

  • Hugo D. Wahlquist (Wahlquist fluid),
  • John Wainwright (dynamical systems techniques in relativistic cosmology, exact solutions)
  • Robert M. Wald (textbook, black hole perturbations, electric fields outside a black hole, quantum field theory on curved spacetimes),
  • Arthur Geoffrey Walker
    Arthur Geoffrey Walker
    Arthur Geoffrey Walker was a leading mathematician who made important contributions to physics and physical cosmology. He was born in Watford, Hertfordshire, England....

     (Fermi/Walker derivatives, Robertson/Walker metric),
  • Anzhong Wang
    Anzhong Wang
    Anzhong Wang is a theoretical physicist, specialized in gravitation, cosmology and astroparticle physics. He is on the Physics faculty of Baylor University...

     (Gravitational Collapse, Cosmology and Horava-Lifshtz Gravity)
  • Joseph Weber
    Joseph Weber
    Joseph Weber was an American physicist. He gave the earliest public lecture on the principles behind the laser and the maser and developed the first gravitational wave detectors .-Early education:...

     (gravitational wave detectors),
  • Hermann Weyl
    Hermann Weyl
    Hermann Klaus Hugo Weyl was a German mathematician and theoretical physicist. Although much of his working life was spent in Zürich, Switzerland and then Princeton, he is associated with the University of Göttingen tradition of mathematics, represented by David Hilbert and Hermann Minkowski.His...

     (Weyl vacuums; see also related list below),
  • John Archibald Wheeler
    John Archibald Wheeler
    John Archibald Wheeler was an American theoretical physicist who was largely responsible for reviving interest in general relativity in the United States after World War II. Wheeler also worked with Niels Bohr in explaining the basic principles behind nuclear fission...

     (coined name "black holes" and popularized them, geometrodynamics, relativistic stars, Zerilli/Wheeler equation, Wheeler/DeWitt equation, textbook),
  • Alfred North Whitehead
    Alfred North Whitehead
    Alfred North Whitehead, OM FRS was an English mathematician who became a philosopher. He wrote on algebra, logic, foundations of mathematics, philosophy of science, physics, metaphysics, and education...

     (competing theory),
  • Bernard F. Whiting (mode stability of Kerr geometry, regularized Green's functions for classical and quantum fields),
  • W. J. Wild (Ernst/Wild electrovacuum),
  • Clifford Martin Will
    Clifford Martin Will
    Clifford Martin Will is a Canadian born mathematical physicist who is well known for his contributions to the theory of general relativity....

     (PPN formalism),
  • Jeffrey Winicour (JNS mcmsf solution, characteristic evolution and matching),
  • Donald M. Witt (topological censorship, chaos),
  • Edward Witten
    Edward Witten
    Edward Witten is an American theoretical physicist with a focus on mathematical physics who is currently a professor of Mathematical Physics at the Institute for Advanced Study....

     (positive energy theorem),
  • Louis Witten
    Louis Witten
    Louis Witten is an American theoretical physicist and the father of Edward Witten.Witten's research has centered around classical gravitation, including the discovery of certain exact electrovacuum solutions to the Einstein field equation...

     (Witten electrovacuum solutions),

X

  • Basilis C. Xanthopoulos
    Basilis C. Xanthopoulos
    Basilis C. Xanthopoulos was a Greek theoretical physicist, well known in the field of general relativity for his contributions to the study of colliding plane waves....

     (Vasilis Xanthopoulous; Chandrasekhar-Xanthopoulos colliding plane wave),

Y

  • Shing-Tung Yau
    Shing-Tung Yau
    Shing-Tung Yau is a Chinese American mathematician working in differential geometry. He was born in Shantou, Guangdong Province, China into a family of scholars from Jiaoling, Guangdong Province....

     (positive energy theorem),
  • James W. York
    James W. York
    James W. York, Jr. is an American mathematical physicist who is well known for his many important contributions to the theory of general relativity...

     (initial value formulation),
  • Ulvi Yurtsever (almost planar gravitational waves),

Z

  • Vladimir E. Zakharov
    Vladimir E. Zakharov
    Vladimir Evgen'evich Zakharov is a Soviet and Russian mathematician and physicist. He is currently Regents' Professor of mathematics at The University of Arizona and director of the Mathematical Physics Sector at the Lebedev Physical Institute...

     (inverse scattering transform solution generating method),
  • Yakov Borisovich Zel'dovich
    Yakov Borisovich Zel'dovich
    Yakov Borisovich Zel'dovich was a prolific Soviet physicist born in Belarus. He played an important role in the development of Soviet nuclear and thermonuclear weapons, and made important contributions to the fields of adsorption and catalysis, shock waves, nuclear physics, particle physics,...

     (early evidence for no hair theorem, first evidence of black hole radiation, maverick theories, relativistic stars and black holes),
  • Franco J. Zerilli (Zerilli/Wheeler equation),
  • Nina Zipser (global nonlinear stability of Minkowski a space of electrovacuums),

See also

  • Contributors to the mathematical background for general relativity
    Contributors to the mathematical background for general relativity
    This is a list of contributors to the mathematical background for general relativity. For ease of readability, the contributions are unlinked but can be found in the contributors' article.-C:...

  • Cosmologists
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