The Nuker Team was formed to use the

Hubble Space Telescope The Hubble Space Telescope (HST or Hubble) is a space telescope that was launched into low Earth orbit in 1990 and remains in operation. It was not the Orbiting Solar Observatory, first space telescope, but it is one of the largest and most ...

, with its high-resolution imaging and spectroscopy, to investigate the central structure and dynamics of galaxies. The team used the HST to examine

supermassive black hole A supermassive black hole (SMBH or sometimes SBH) is the largest type of black hole, with its mass being on the order of hundreds of thousands, or millions to billions, of times the mass of the Sun (). Black holes are a class of astronomical ...

s and determined the relationship between a galaxy's central black hole's mass and velocity dispersion. The team continues to conduct research and publish papers on the supermassive black holes of galaxies and clusters. The group was initially formed by Tod R. Lauer, then a first year postdoc. At the first meeting of the group held at

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...

in June 1985,

Sandra Faber Sandra Moore Faber (born December 28, 1944) is an American astrophysicist known for her research on the evolution of galaxies. She is the University Professor of Astronomy and Astrophysics at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and works a ...

was elected the group leader.

Members

The original members of the Nuker Team include

Alan Dressler Alan Michael Dressler (born 23 March 1948) is an American astronomer at the Carnegie Institution for Science of Washington, D.C. Among his works is the popularization ''Voyage To The Great Attractor: Exploring Intergalactic Space''. Dressler wa ...

(OCIW),

(UCO/Lick; First PI), John Kormendy (Texas), Tod R. Lauer (NOAO),

Douglas Richstone Douglas may refer to: People * Douglas (given name) * Douglas (surname) Animals * Douglas (parrot), macaw that starred as the parrot ''Rosalinda'' in Pippi Longstocking * Douglas the camel, a camel in the Confederate Army in the American Civil ...

(Michigan; Present PI), and

Scott Tremaine Scott Duncan Tremaine (born 1950) is a Canadian-born astrophysicist. He is a fellow of the Royal Society of London, the Royal Society of Canada and the National Academy of Sciences. Tremaine is widely regarded as one of the world's leading ast ...

(IAS). Later additions to the team include Ralf Bender (Munchen), Alexei V. Filippenko (Berkeley),

Karl Gebhardt Karl Franz Gebhardt (23 November 1897 – 2 June 1948) was a Nazi physician and a war criminal. Gebhardt was the main coordinator of a series of medical atrocities performed on inmates of the concentration camps at Ravensbrück and Auschwitz. ...

(Texas), Richard Green (LBTO),

Kayhan Gultekin ''Kayhan'' () is a Persian language, Persian-language newspaper published in Tehran, Iran. It is considered "the most Iranian Principlists, conservative and hard-line Iranian newspaper." Hossein Shariatmadari is the editor-in-chief of ''Kayh ...

(Michigan), Luis C. Ho (OCIW),

John Magorrian John Magorrian is an astrophysicist in the Rudolf Peierls Centre for Theoretical Physics at the University of Oxford. His research relates to the modelling of the structure and evolution of galaxies. He is a member of the Nuker Team of the Hubble ...

(Oxford),

Jason Pinkney Jason ( ; ) was an ancient Greek mythological hero and leader of the Argonauts, whose quest for the Golden Fleece is featured in Greek literature. He was the son of Aeson, the rightful king of Iolcos. He was married to the sorceress Medea, t ...

(Ohio Northern), and

Christos Siopis Christos may refer to: * Jesus of Nazareth * Christ (title), a title for the Jewish Messiah in Christianity * Christos (surname) * Christos (given name) *, a Greek owned, Liberian flagged cargo ship in service 1962-71 See also * Christ (disamb ...

(Michigan).

Etymology

The name "Nuker" began as an informal internal reference by members of the team to each other, because they came together to study the nuclei of galaxies using the space telescope. The first use of the name was in a 1989 email from

Faber Faber may refer to: People * Faber (surname) Companies * Faber & Faber, publishing house in the United Kingdom * Faber-Castell, German manufacturer of writing instruments * Faber Music, British sheet music publisher * Eberhard Faber, German ...

, who addressed her five colleagues as "Dear Nukers". As the team began to publish its research, the name came into general use in the scientific community. The name "Nuker" is also used in reference to the "

Nuker Law Nuker may refer to: *Nuker, microwave oven *Nuker, high-capacity Internet Web distribution site or topsite (warez) *A (usually malicious) program designed to disable a computer or destroy data *Nuker Team The Nuker Team was formed to use the Hub ...

", which is a description of the inner few (~3-10) arcseconds of predominantly nearby (< 30 Mpc) early-type galaxy light-profiles. The Nuker Law was described first by members of the Nuker Team, from which it gets its name.''Ibid.''

References

Sources

* Stern, S. Alan, ''Our Universe: The Thrill of Extragalactic Exploration As Told by Leading Experts'', Cambridge University Press, 2001 and

External links

*
Nuker Team Refereed Publications

Transcript of BBC Horizon and Science Channel documentary

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