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Griechische Wissenschaftler
Xanthopoulos and Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar
Image from http://1lyk-dramas.dra.sch.gr/xanthopoulos/indexen.htm
Basilis (or Vasilis) Xanthopoulos was a Greek theoretical physicist who made important contributions in Relativity and gravitational physics. Xanthopoulos and Stephanos Pnevmatikos were shot to death by a mad student (the 32 year old Giorgos Petrodaskalakis) on the evening of November 27, 1990.
He was born in Drama, Greece. He studied Mathematics at the University of Thessaloniki. He went to Chicago USA for a postgraduate course getting a master degree (1976) and a PhD (1978) in Science. He taught at the Universities of Montana, Syracuse, Harvard, and the Max Planck Institute. He was a lecturer of Astronomy at the University of Thessaloniki (1980-1982) and was elected professor and chairman of the Physical Science department of the University of Crete.
Xanthopoulos was one of the closest collaborators of Chandra since the time when he was studying for his PhD at the University of Chicago. They published together many papers on black holes, colliding gravitational waves, space time perturbations and other general relativity topics. Chandra visited many times Greece giving lectures in Athens, Thessaloniki and Crete.
As Professor S. Chandrasekhar* (or Chandra) said the solutions worked with Xanthopoulos for both the Einstein vacuum and the Einstein-Maxwell equations had upset the then held conventional belief that the collision of waves would lead on to the development of curvature singularities. Indeed, in Professor Chandrasekhar’s words, "One found instead that event horizons formed; and a further domain which included hyperbolic arc-like singularities reminiscent of the Kerr and the Kerr-Newman black holes." Actually this situation is conceptualized in a delightfully different context by Lewis Carroll (the pen-name of the nineteenth-century Oxford mathematician Charles L. Dodgson) in his celebrated work Through the Looking Glass which is meant for children. In fact, Professor Chandrasekhar creates an ambience, at once mathematical and literary, which suggests Alice’s intimations of Space-Time Through the Looking Glass: "It (the passage through the Looking Glass House) is like our passage as far as you can see, only you know it may be quite different on beyond".
Professor Chandrasekhar has adorned Einstein’s "Natural home" — which is astronomy — with the landscapes of Relativistic Astrophysics and Monet’s Impressionistic Paintings. Actually the landscapes of General Relativity based on some mathematical structures, such as Chandrasekhar’s mathematical theory of black holes, the Chandrasekhar-Xanthopoulos field equations relating to the collision of impulsive gravitational waves and electromagnetic shock waves and the Subrahmanyan-Chandrasekhar-Valeria Ferari work on the non-radial oscillation of stars can be interpreted as an interplay of entropy, geometry and gravity.
The Xanthopoulos Award was set up by the Foundation for Research and Technology -Hellas in memory of Professor Xanthopoulos. It is given tri-annually to a scientist, below 40 years of age, who has made outstanding (preferably theoretical) contributions to gravitational physics. The monetary value of the Award is approximately $10000. The previous winners of the Award are Professors Demetrios Christodoulou, Gary Horowitz and Carlo Rovelli.
Over the past two years, the International Society for General Relativity and Gravitation (GRG) and the Foundation for Research and Technology -Hellas reached an agreement and from now on the prize be presented by the President of the GRG Society during its tri-annual conferences. Before each conference, the winner will be chosen by a selection committee consisting of five to seven distinguished scientists, each serving for two to three rounds. An advisory Board will oversee the Award and ensure that the original intent of the Award continues to be served.
*1983 Nobel Physics prize for his theoretical studies of the physical processes of importance to the structure and evolution of the stars
A small list of Publications by Xanthopoulos et al:
Journals
Demetrios B. Papadopoulos and Basilis C. Xanthopoulos, Tomimatsu–Sato electrovacuum cosmic string solutions for =2 interacting with gravitational waves, J. Math. Phys. 36(8) 4248 (01 Aug 1995)
Basilis C. Xanthopoulos and Thomas Zannias, Kantowski–Sachs metrics with source: A massless scalar field, J. Math. Phys. 33(4) 1415 (01 Apr 1992)
Basilis C. Xanthopoulos and Thomas Zannias, Kantowski–Sachs metrics with source: A conformally invariant scalar field, J. Math. Phys. 33(4) 1420 (01 Apr 1992)
Basilis C. Xanthopoulos and Thanassis E. Dialynas, Einstein gravity coupled to a massless conformal scalar field in arbitrary space-time dimensions, J. Math. Phys. 33(4) 1463 (01 Apr 1992)
Dmitry V. Gal'tsov and Basilis C. Xanthopoulos, A generating technique for Einstein gravity conformally coupled to a scalar field with Higgs potential J. Math. Phys. 33(1) 273 (01 Jan 1992)
Basilis C. Xanthopoulos and Thomas Zannias, The gravity of three-forms, J. Math. Phys. 32(9) 2459 (01 Sep 1991)
Basilis C. Xanthopoulos, Linear perturbations of plane polarized plane waves. II. The Einstein–Maxwell perturbations, J. Math. Phys. 32(7) 1866 (01 Jul 1991)
Basilis C. Xanthopoulos and Thomas Zannias, The uniqueness of the Bekenstein black hole, J. Math. Phys. 32(7) 1875 (01 Jul 1991)
Basilis C. Xanthopoulos, Linear perturbations of plane polarized plane waves. I. The absence of purely incoming perturbations, J. Math. Phys. 30(11) 2626 (01 Nov 1989)
Taxiarchis Papacostas and Basilis C. Xanthopoulos, Collisions of gravitational and electromagnetic waves that do not develop curvature singularities,J. Math. Phys. 30(1) 97 (01 Jan 1989)
Sotirios Persides and Basilis C. Xanthopoulos, Some new stationary axisymmetric asymptotically flat space-times obtained from Painlevé transcendents, J. Math. Phys. 29(3) 674 (01 Mar 1988)
Basilis C. Xanthopoulos, Perfect fluids satisfying a less than extremely relativistic equation of state, J. Math. Phys. 28(4) 905 (01 Apr 1987)
Basilis C. Xanthopoulos, The initial value problem for colliding gravitational and hydrodynamic waves, J. Math. Phys. 27(8) 2129 (01 Aug 1986)
Basilis C. Xanthopoulos, Exterior spacetimes for rotating stars J. Math. Phys. 22(6) 1254 (01 Jun 1981)
C. Hoenselaers, William Kinnersley, and Basilis C. Xanthopoulos, Symmetries of the stationary Einstein–Maxwell equations. VI. Transformations which generate asymptotically flat spacetimes with arbitrary multipole moments, J. Math. Phys. 20(12) 2530 (01 Dec 1979)
Abhay Ashtekar and Basilis C. Xanthopoulos , Isometries compatible with asymptotic flatness at null infinity: A complete description, J. Math. Phys. 19(10) 2216 (01 Oct 1978)
Basilis C. Xanthopoulos, Exact vacuum solutions of Einstein's equation from linearized solutions, J. Math. Phys. 19(7) 1607 (01 Jul 1978)
Robert Geroch and Basilis C. Xanthopoulos, Asymptotic simplicity is stable, J. Math. Phys. 19(3) 714 (01 Mar 1978)
Chandrasekhar, S. and Xanthopoulos, B. C. (1985a). On colliding waves in the Einstein–Maxwell theory, Proc. Roy. Soc. A, 398, 223–259.
Chandrasekhar, S. and Xanthopoulos, B. C. (1985b). On the collision of impulsive gravitational waves when coupled with fluid motions, Proc. Roy. Soc. A, 402, 37–65.
Chandrasekhar, S. and Xanthopoulos, B. C. (1985c). Some exact solutions of gravitational waves coupled with fluid motions, Proc. Roy. Soc. A, 402, 205–224.
Chandrasekhar, S. and Xanthopoulos, B. C. (1986a). On the collision of impulsive waves when coupled with null dust, Proc. Roy. Soc. A, 403, 189–198.
Chandrasekhar, S. and Xanthopoulos, B. C. (1986b). A new type of singularity created by colliding gravitational waves, Proc. Roy. Soc. A, 408, 175–208.
Chandrasekhar, S. and Xanthopoulos, B. C. (1987a). On colliding waves that develop time-like singularities: a new class of solutions of the Einstein–Maxwell equations, Proc. Roy. Soc. A, 410, 311–336.
Chandrasekhar, S. and Xanthopoulos, B. C. (1987b). The effect of sources on horizons that develop when plane gravitational waves collide, Proc. Roy. Soc. A, 414, 1–30.
Chandrasekhar, S. and Xanthopoulos, B. C. (1988). A perturbation analysis of the Bell–Szekeres space-time, Proc. Roy. Soc. A, 420, 93–123.
Books
S. Chandrasekhar, Basilis C. Xanthopoulos, The Mathematical Theory of Black Holes and of Colliding Plane Waves, Selected Papers, Vol 6, University of Chicago Press; (February 1991)
References
A. Ranganathan, Transmutation from One Form to Another, The Interaction of Colour and the Elements, Some Scientific and Aesthetic Considerations.
S. Perides
The 1st Lyceum in Drama, Greece
George Yatromanolakis (or Jorgi or Yoryis Jatromanolakis) (Γιώργης Γιατρομανωλάκης) (1940 ), Staatlicher Preis, Kazantzakis Preis, Bericht von einem vorbestimmten Mord, (Ein Roman über den Tod zweier Physik Professoren auf Kreta)
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