Oxford University Astronomy
Katherine Blundell is a Professor of Astrophysics at Oxford University and a Research Fellow at St John's College. Prior to this she was one of the Royal Society's University Research Fellows, having been a Research Fellow of the Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851 and before that a Junior Research Fellow at Balliol College, Oxford.
Her awards include a Philip Leverhulme Prize in Astrophysics, the Royal Society's Rosalind Franklin Medal in 2010, the Institute of Physics Bragg Medal in 2012 and the Royal Astronomical Society's Darwin Lectureship in 2015.
Her research interests span a broad range of topics. She has published extensively on the evolution of active galaxies and their life cycles, on the accretion of material near black holes and the launch and propagation of relativistic jets. She uses techniques from across the electromagnetic spectrum, both imaging and spectroscopy, as well as computational techniques.
Schedule
Tutorial work
A major project she has initiated is Global Jet Watch, which aims to:
I have written a Very Short Introduction to Black Holes published by Oxford University Press in December 2015.
I have written a book, together with Professor Stephen Blundell, called "Concepts in Thermal Physics" which was published by Oxford University Press in July 2006; the second edition was brought out in October 2009. This book covers kinetic theory, thermodynamics, statistical mechanics and applications in astrophysics, atmospheric physics, information theory and many other areas.
Energy... beyond Oil is an immense challenge for Earth's inhabitants given the centrality of fossil fuels to the world's economies. Professor Fraser Armstrong and I have edited a book covering a wide range of present and future energy solutions including energy from the sun, wind, tides and fusion.