Steven Gregory Rawlings (11 October 1961 – 11 January 2012) was a British astrophysicist at the

University of Oxford The University of Oxford is a collegiate university, collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the List of oldest un ...

, where he held a professorship in astrophysics and a

fellowship A fellow is a title and form of address for distinguished, learned, or skilled individuals in academia, medicine, research, and industry. The exact meaning of the term differs in each field. In learned or professional societies, the term refers ...

at St Peter's College. He studied

physics Physics is the scientific study of matter, its Elementary particle, fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge whi ...

and

theoretical physics Theoretical physics is a branch of physics that employs mathematical models and abstractions of physical objects and systems to rationalize, explain, and predict List of natural phenomena, natural phenomena. This is in contrast to experimental p ...

St John's College, Cambridge St John's College, formally the College of St John the Evangelist in the University of Cambridge, is a Colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge, founded by the House of Tudor, Tudor matriarch L ...

and received his PhD in

radio astronomy Radio astronomy is a subfield of astronomy that studies Astronomical object, celestial objects using radio waves. It started in 1933, when Karl Jansky at Bell Telephone Laboratories reported radiation coming from the Milky Way. Subsequent observat ...

in 1988. He was one of the lead scientists in the

Square Kilometre Array The Square Kilometre Array (SKA) is an intergovernmental organisation, intergovernmental international radio telescope project being built in Australia (low-frequency) and South Africa (mid-frequency). The combining infrastructure, the Square ...

project. On 11 January 2012, Rawlings died at the

Southmoor Southmoor is a village in the civil parish of Kingston Bagpuize with Southmoor, about west of Abingdon, Oxfordshire. Historically part of Berkshire, the 1974 boundary changes transferred local government to Oxfordshire. Southmoor village is ...

home of close friend and colleague Dr Devinder Sivia, a lecturer in mathematics for the sciences at St John's College. Sivia said that Rawlings, who had been receiving treatment for unspecified mental health issues, began to physically attack him, and Sivia held him in a headlock to restrain him; Rawlings died from a heart attack shortly thereafter. The coroner recorded a verdict of accidental death. Sivia and Rawlings co-wrote the book ''Foundations of Science Mathematics'', published in 1999 by

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the publishing house of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world. Its first book was printed in Oxford in 1478, with the Press officially granted the legal right to print books ...

. On 27 August 2013, the

LOFAR LOFAR may refer to: * Low-Frequency Array, a large radio telescope system based in the Netherlands * Low Frequency Analyzer and Recorder and Low Frequency Analysis and Recording, for low-frequency sounds {{disambiguation ...

radio telescope station at

Chilbolton Observatory The Chilbolton Observatory is a facility for atmospheric and radio research located on the edge of the village of Chilbolton near Stockbridge in Hampshire, England. The facilities are run by the STFC Radio Communications Research Unit of the R ...

was named ''The Rawlings Array'' in his honour.The Rawlings Array
Report 27 August 2013

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rawlings, Steven Gregory 1961 births 2012 deaths 20th-century British astronomers 21st-century British astronomers Accidental deaths in England Alumni of St John's College, Cambridge British astrophysicists British cosmologists Fellows of St Peter's College, Oxford Radio astronomers