Andrew Robinson
Contact Information
| Office | CAR 1270 |
| Phone | (585) 475-2726 |
| axrsps@rit.edu |
Andy Robinson received his Ph.D. in Astrophysics from the University of Manchester in 1985. After graduating, he worked as a post-doc at the European Southern Observatory and at the Institute of Astronomy of the University of Cambridge. He was awarded a Royal Society University Research Fellowship in 1990 and held this appointment for 10 years before becoming a member of the faculty in the Department of Physical Sciences at the University of Hertfordshire. In Fall 2003 he crossed the Atlantic to join the Physics Department at RIT. Dr Robinson's main areas of expertise are astronomical spectroscopy and spectropolarimetry and the astrophysics of photoionized gases. His research interests focus on nuclear activity in galaxies and in particular the processes that regulate energy release by accretion onto supermassive black holes.
Job Responsibilities
Dr Robinson is the Astronomy Minor advisor and the current Director of the Astrophysical Sciences and Technology Graduate Program.
Selected Publications
Spectropolarimetric Evidence for a Kicked Supermassive Black Hole in the Quasar E1821+643, Robinson, A., Young, S., Axon, D.J., Kharb, P., Smith, J.E., Astrophys. J. Lett. 717, L122 (2010).
A Displaced Supermassive Black Hole in M87, Batcheldor, D.; Robinson, A.; Axon, D. J.; Perlman, E. S.; Merritt, D., Astrophys. J. Lett. 717, L6 (2010).
The Contribution from Scattered Light to Quasar Galaxy Hosts, Young, S.; Axon, D. J.; Robinson, A.; Capetti, A., 2009, Astrophys. J., 698, L121 (2009).
The Rotating Wind of the Quasar PG 1700+518, Young, S., Axon, D.J., Robinson, A., Hough, J.H., Smith, J.E., Nature, 450, 74-76 (2007).
The nature of the HE0450-2958 system, Merritt, D.; Storchi-Bergmann, T.; Robinson, A.; Batcheldor, D.; Axon, D.; Cid Fernandes, R., Mon. Not. R. astr. Soc., 367, 1746 (2006).
Seyferts on the edge: polar scattering in Type 1 Seyfert nuclei, Smith J. E., Robinson A., Young S., Axon D. J., Corbett Elizabeth A., Mon. Not. R. astr. Soc., 350, 140 (2004).
Recent Talks
Observational Signatures of Recoiling Supermassive Black Holes, Invited talk, Galaxy Mergers from the Largest to the Smallest Scales, AAS Summer Meeting, Anchorage, 14 June, 2012
Exploring the Inner Regions of Active Galactic Nuclei with Spectropolarimetry, Physics Department Colloquium, Bucknell University, 22 October, 2011
Probing gas flows around supermassive black holes with Spectropolarimetry, Astronomy Colloquium, University of Kentucky, 31 March, 2011
Reflections on Kicked Supermassive Black Holes, Joint UVA/NRAO Colloquium, University of Virginia, 11 March, 2011
Reflections on Kicked Supermassive Black Holes, Colloquium at the Department of Physics & Astronomy, University of Sheffield, 30 July 2010
Probing gas flows around supermassive black holes with Spectropolarimetry âWhat drives the growth pf black holes? Workshop at the University of Durham, UK, 26-29 July, 2010
Press releases
Supermassive Black Holes May Frequently Roam Galaxy Centers
RIT Astronomer Mines Spitzer Space Telescope Data for Massive Starbursts
Supermassive Black Holes Produce Powerful Galaxy-Shaping Winds. There is also a podcast hosted by Universe Today.