Grant Mathews

Research Interests

Prof. Mathews’ research interests involve the origin and evolution of matter in the universe from the first instants of cosmic expansion in the big bang to the present complex interactions of stars and gas in galaxies. Current research topics include the nature and origin of dark energy and dark matter. Other studies include general-relativistic hydrodynamic simulations of orbiting, accreting, collapsing and/or merging white dwarfs, neutron stars, and black holes. Of particular ongoing interest is the study of the origin of elements in stars and supernovae and the big bang. He is currently developing supernova models to identify the site for rapid neutron-capture (r-process) nucleosynthesis and study effects of the nuclear equation of state on the evolution of supernovae and neutron stars. He also studies hydrodynamic models for the formation and evolution of cosmic large-scale structure, galaxies and globular clusters. These are used to place constraints on models for dark matter and dark energy and the chemical evolution of the elements.