About the Authors

Roger A. Freedman is on the faculty of the Department of Physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He grew up in San Diego, California, and was an undergraduate at the University of California campuses in San Diego and Los Angeles. He did his doctoral research in nuclear theory and its astrophysical applications at Stanford University under the direction of Professor J. Dirk Walecka. Dr. Freedman joined the faculty at UCSB in 1981 after three years of teaching and doing research at the University of Washington. Dr. Freedman holds a commercial pilot’s license, and when not teaching or writing he can frequently be found flying with his wife, Caroline. He has flown across the United States and Canada. (Photo courtesy of Caroline J. Robillard)

 

Robert M. Geller teaches and conducts research in astrophysics at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he also obtained his Ph.D. His doctoral research was in observational cosmology under Professor Robert Antonucci. Using data from the Hubble Space Telescope, he is currently involved in a search for bursts of light that are predicted to occur when a supermassive black hole consumes a star. His other project, in biomedicine, explores the use of magnetotactic bacteria to enhance the effectiveness of radiation therapy in treating cancer. Dr. Geller also has a strong emphasis on education, and he received the Distinguished Teaching Award at UCSB in 2003. His hobbies include rock climbing, and he built an unusual telescope with lenses made of water. (Photo courtesy of Richard Rouse)

 

William J. Kaufmann III was the author of the first four editions of Universe. Dr. Kaufmann earned his bachelor’s degree magna cum laude in physics from Adelphi University in 1963, a master’s degree in physics from Rutgers in 1965, and a Ph.D. in astrophysics from Indiana University in 1968. At 27, he became the youngest director of any major planetarium in the United States when he took the helm of the Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles. During his career, he also held positions at San Diego State University, UCLA, Caltech, and the University of Illinois. A prolific author, his many books include Black Holes and Warped Spacetime, Relativity and Cosmology, Planets and Moons, Stars and Nebulas, and Galaxies and Quasars. Dr. Kaufmann died in 1994.