DEPARTMENT OF PHYSICS AND ASTRONOMY

Raffaella Margutti is an astrophysicist who utilizes observations of transient astrophysical phenomena including stellar explosions and stellar tidal disruptions by supermassive black holes. Her research specifically focuses on the biggest explosions and disruptions that occur in our Universe: Supernovae, Gamma-Ray Bursts, compact stellar mergers and tidal disruption events. Margutti investigates the physics of these events by combining broad-band observations across the electromagnetic spectrum, including X-ray, UV, optical, IR, and radio.  The primary goal of her research is to understand the nature of the physical processes that regulate such dramatic displays. 

Awards and Honors

• Sloan Research Fellow
• Scialog Fellow
• James Arthur Research Associate at New York University, visiting scientist at the American Museum of Natural History, New York
• Harvard Postdoctoral Fellow at the Center for Astrophysics (CfA), Institute for Theory and Computation (ITC), USA, mentor Ramesh Narayan, advisor Alicia Soderberg
• “Swift” post-doc at the INAF Brera Observatory (Milan); national coordinator of the Swift Italian Burst Advocates