Search

Lars Hernquist receives the AAS 2026 Henry Norris Russell Lectureship

News

Lars Hernquist, Mallinckrodt Professor of Astrophysics at Harvard, received the 2026 Henry Norris Russell Lectureship at the AAS 247 conference in January 2026. The honor celebrates a career of eminence in astronomical research, for a lifetime of...

Lars Hernquist

Person

Research Interests: Theoretical studies of dynamical processes in cosmology and galaxy formation/galaxy evolution. Numerical simulations of stellar dynamical and hydrodynamical systems. Investigations of the physics of compact objects, particularly...

2020 Gruber Prize in Cosmology has been awarded to Harvard's Lars Hernquist and Volker Springel of the Max Planck Institute

News

Citations reads: "The 2020 Gruber Cosmology Prize recognizes Lars Hernquist, Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian, and Volker Springel, Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics, for their defining contributions to cosmological simulations, a...

Congratulations to the Class of 2024!

News

The Astronomy Department congratulates the 2024 PhD students! Ana Maria Delgado defended her thesis on “Analyzing cosmological-hydrodynamical simulations in light of future optical surveys.” Her advisor was Lars Hernquist. Michael Foley defended his...

Congratulations 2018 PhDs

News

Congratulations to the class of 2018. Kate Alexander , Edo Berger, Cosmic Extremes: Probing Energetic Transients with Radio Observations; Alexander will take her NASA Hubble Fellowship as an Einstein Fellow at Northwestern University. Fernando Becerra...

Astronomy Chairs

Page

Donald Menzel 1945–1949 Fred Whipple 1949–1956 Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin 1956–1960 William Liller 1960–1964 Charles Whitney 1964–1965 (acting) William Liller 1965–1966 Leo Goldberg 1966–1970 Alexander Dalgarno 1970–1976 Alastair Cameron 1976–1982 William...

The Art of Science Exhibit - Feb 11 - April 7, Kimball Art Center

News

Many of you watched the spiral arm movie on the ITC display near the elevator. This beautiful movie, produced by the ITC members: Elena D'Onghia, Mark Vogelsberger, and Lars Hernquist, has been selected to be exhibited between 2/11-4/7, 2012 at the...

Thesis Topics

Page

2026 Victoria DiTomasso, "The Discovery of Three Nearby Planetary Systems, and a Population of Ancient Jovians Orbiting Stars in the Galactic Thick Disk" (May 4, 2026) Advisor: David Charbonneau Vedant Chandra, "Mapping the Uncharted Horizons of the Milky...

Contact

Page

Astronomy Department Chair David Charbonneau Administrative Staff Department Administrator: Peg Herlihy Graduate Coordinator: Mark Palmer Faculty Assistant for Profs. Berger, Eisenstein, and Conroy: Lisa Catella Division Administrator for Profs. Loeb...

Eric Keto Prize

Page

The Eric R. Keto Prize for Graduate Students in Theoretical Astrophysics, endowed with a generous donation by ITC Senior Member Eric Keto, is awarded each year for the best thesis in theoretical astrophysics by a student at the CfA, as selected by the...

Theoretical Cosmology

Page

Simulating galaxy formation (Image credit: Debora Sijacki, Mark Vogelsberger, Lars Hernquist) Research Description Since the Universe is expanding, it must have been denser in the past. But even before we get all the way back to the Big Bang, there must...

Astronomers Create First Realistic Virtual Universe

News

This groundbreaking model of the universe called Illustris was created by a team of post-doc researchers headed up by Faculty member, Lars Hernquist, and graduate student, Dylan Nelson. This work was first described in a recent Nature article. "It's hard...