Victoria M. Kaspi
Appointment
Program Director
R. Howard Webster Foundation Fellow
Gravity & the Extreme Universe
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About
Victoria Kaspi is an astrophysicist whose research focuses on neutron stars: massive, dense celestial objects that emit bursts of radiation as they rotate, and that are formed when a massive star explodes.
Kaspi studies heavy-duty physics – a neutron star is so dense that one teaspoon would weigh 100 million metric tonnes. She uses the largest and most powerful radio and X-ray telescopes in the world to study their physical behaviour. Since neutron stars are the remnants of exploded stars, understanding how they behave reveals how massive stars collapse and what happens during this process. Kaspi’s work sheds light on the nature of matter under extraordinary circumstances, as well as in less extreme settings here on Earth.
Awards
- Gerhard Herzberg Canada Gold Medal, 2016
- Companion of the Order of Canada, 2016
- Killam Prize, 2015
- Peter G. Martin Award, Canadian Astronomical Society, 2013
- Killam Research Fellowship, 2010
Relevant Publications
Chatterjee, S. et al. “A direct localization of a fast radio burst and its host.” Nature 541 (2017).
Scholz, P. et al. “The Repeating Fast Radio Burst FRB 121102: Multi-wavelength Observations and Additional Bursts.” ApJ 833 (2016).
Archibald, R. et al. “A Magnetar-like Outburst from a High-B Radio Pulsar.” ApJ 829 (2016).
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