Indian-origin astronomer wins UK’s Royal Astronomical Society Gold Medal

Key Highlights

• In receiving the highest honour from the historic organisation, awarded annually since 1824, he joins great scientific minds such as Stephen Hawking, Jocelyn Bell Burnell, Albert Einstein and Edwin Hubble.
• “I was very surprised to hear the news, especially given the stellar list of past winners,” said Kulkarni.
• “I would like to thank my long-term collaborators and the engineering crew and members of the Palomar Transient Factory and the Zwicky Transient Facility for their immense contribution to the projects,” he said.
• The scientist described this discovery of the first millisecond pulsar as “the most fun achievement in my life”, adding: “I was a graduate student when I made the discovery.
• I could not sleep for several days!” Kulkarni, who also won the 2024 Shaw Prize in Astronomy recently, joined Caltech in 1985 and has since made many landmark findings including demonstrating in 1997 that powerful gamma-ray bursts originate outside our galaxy.