Russell Alan Hulse facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Russell Alan Hulse
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Hulse at the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory
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| Born | November 28, 1950 New York City, U.S.
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| Nationality | American |
| Alma mater | Cooper Union (BS) UMass Amherst (PhD) |
| Awards | Nobel Prize in Physics (1993) |
| Scientific career | |
| Institutions | UT Dallas Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory NRAO |
| Doctoral advisor | Joseph Hooton Taylor Jr. |
Russell Alan Hulse (born November 28, 1950) is an American physicist. He won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1993. He shared this award with his teacher, Joseph Hooton Taylor Jr.. They won for finding a new kind of pulsar. This discovery helped scientists learn more about gravitation, which is the force that pulls things together.
About Russell Hulse
Russell Hulse was born in New York City. He went to the Bronx High School of Science and then to the Cooper Union college. In 1975, he earned his PhD in physics from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. A PhD is a very high university degree.
While he was studying for his PhD in 1974, he worked at the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico. This observatory has a very large radio telescope. There, he worked with Joseph Taylor to search for pulsars. A pulsar is a special kind of neutron star that spins very fast. As it spins, it sends out beams of radio waves, like a lighthouse.
Discovering Binary Pulsars
In 1974, Hulse and Taylor made an amazing discovery. They found the first ever binary pulsar, called PSR B1913+16. A binary pulsar is made of two objects orbiting each other. In this case, it was a pulsar and another very dense, unseen star.
The pulsar sends out very regular radio signals. By carefully watching these signals, Hulse and Taylor noticed something important. The way the pulsar moved showed that it was losing energy. This energy was being sent out as gravitational radiation, also known as gravitational waves.
Albert Einstein had predicted gravitational waves in 1918. However, no one had ever directly seen proof of them until Hulse and Taylor's discovery. Their work provided the first strong evidence that these waves exist. It also showed that Einstein's theory of general relativity was correct.
In 1993, Russell Hulse and Joseph Taylor received the Nobel Prize in Physics for their groundbreaking discovery.
Later Work and Education
After getting his PhD, Russell Hulse continued his research at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory. Later, he moved to Princeton, where he worked at the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory.
Russell Hulse is also very interested in science education. He wants to help more young people learn about science. In 2003, he became a visiting professor at the University of Texas at Dallas. He taught physics and worked on programs to improve science and mathematics education.
In 2004, he became the first director of the UT Dallas Science and Engineering Education Center (SEEC). He was also chosen as a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2003. This is an honor given to scientists who have made important contributions.
See also
In Spanish: Russell Hulse para niños
