Cormac O'Raifeartaigh

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Cormac O'Raifeartaigh
NationalityIrish
Alma mater
Scientific career
FieldsPhysics
InstitutionsWaterford Institute of Technology
Websiteantimatter.ie

Cormac O'Raifeartaigh (Cormac O'Rafferty) is an Irish physicist based at Waterford Institute of Technology in Ireland. A solid-state physicist by training, he is best known for several contributions to the study of the history and philosophy of 20th century science, including the discovery that Albert Einstein once attempted a steady-state model of the expanding universe, many years before Fred Hoyle.[1][2][3][4]

O'Raifeartaigh is known to the public as the author of the science blog Antimatter and a monthly science column in The Irish Times. As a science ambassador for Discover Science & Engineering Ireland, he is a frequent participant in scientific debates in the Irish media.[citation needed]

O'Raifeartaigh graduated from University College Dublin in 1988 with a BSc Hons in experimental physics. A PhD in solid-state physics from Trinity College Dublin in 1994 was followed by Marie Curie Research Fellowships at Aarhus University, Denmark and Trinity College Dublin. He currently lectures in physics at Waterford Institute of Technology and is a visiting associate professor at the School of Physics at University College Dublin.[citation needed]

O'Raifeartaigh was elected a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society in 2014 and a Fellow of the Institute of Physics in 2016. He is a research associate at the School of Theoretical Physics of the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies and was a research fellow at the Science, Technology and Society Program at Harvard University in 2010–2011.[citation needed]

Cormac is the youngest son of the late Lochlainn O'Raifeartaigh, an Irish theoretical particle physicist.[5]

References[edit]

  1. ^ Castelvecchi, Davide (24 February 2014). "Einstein's lost theory uncovered: Physicist explored the idea of a steady-state Universe in 1931". Nature.
  2. ^ "A forgotten model of the universe: Analysis of Einstein's 1931 paper featuring a dynamic model of the universe". Science Daily. 19 February 2014.
  3. ^ Farrell, J. (25 February 2014). "New Discovery Reveals Einstein Tried To Devise A Steady State Model Of The Universe". Forbes magazine.
  4. ^ O'Raifeartaigh, Cormac; McCann, Brendan; Nahm, Werner; Mitton, Simon (2014). "Einstein's steady-state theory: An abandoned model of the cosmos". The European Physical Journal H. 39 (3): 353–367. arXiv:1402.0132. Bibcode:2014EPJH...39..353O. doi:10.1140/epjh/e2014-50011-x. S2CID 38384067.
  5. ^ "Irish physicist who had a theorem named after him". The Irish Times. Retrieved 5 November 2021.