Rainer Weiss

Rainer Weiss was born in Berlin, Germany, the son of Gertrude Loesner and Frederick A. Weiss.^[10][11] His father, a physician, neurologist, and psychoanalyst, was forced out of Germany by Nazis because he was Jewish and an active member of the Communist Party. His mother, an actress, was Christian.^[12] His aunt was the sociologist Hilda Weiss.

The family fled first to Prague, but Germany's occupation of Czechoslovakia after the 1938 Munich Agreement caused them to flee again; the philanthropic Stix family of St. Louis helped them obtain visas to enter the United States.^[13] Weiss spent his youth in New York City, where he attended Columbia Grammar School. He studied at MIT, dropped out during his junior year,^[14] but eventually returned to receive his S.B. degree in 1955 and Ph.D. degree in 1962 under Jerrold Zacharias.^[15]

He taught at Tufts University from 1960 to 1962, was a postdoctoral scholar at Princeton University from 1962 to 1964, and then joined the faculty at MIT in 1964.^[10]

In a 2022 interview given to Federal University of Pará in Brazil, Weiss talks about his life and career, the memories of his childhood and youth, his undergraduate and graduate studies at MIT, and the future of gravitational waves astronomy.^[16]

Weiss brought two fields of fundamental physics research from birth to maturity: characterization of the cosmic background radiation,^[3] and interferometric gravitational wave observation.

In 1973 he made pioneering measurements of the spectrum of the cosmic microwave background radiation, taken from a weather balloon, showing that the microwave background exhibited the thermal spectrum characteristic of the remnant radiation from the Big Bang.^[14] He later became co-founder and science advisor of the NASA Cosmic Background Explorer (COBE) satellite,^[1] which made detailed mapping of the radiation.

Weiss also pioneered the concept of using lasers for an interferometric gravitational wave detector, suggesting that the path length required for such a detector would necessitate kilometer-scale arms. He built a prototype in the 1970s, following earlier work by Robert L. Forward.^[17][18] He co-founded the NSF LIGO (gravitational-wave detection) project,^[19] which was based on his report "A study of a long Baseline Gravitational Wave Antenna System".^[20]

Both of these efforts couple challenges in instrument science with physics important to the understanding of the Universe.^[21]

In February 2016, he was one of the four scientists of LIGO/Virgo collaboration presenting at the press conference for the announcement that the first direct gravitational wave observation had been made in September 2015.^{[22][23][24][25][a]}

Rainer Weiss has been recognized by numerous awards including:

• In 2006, with John C. Mather, he and the COBE team received the Gruber Prize in Cosmology.^[2]
• In 2007, with Ronald Drever, he was awarded the APS Einstein Prize for his work.^[26]
• In 2016 and 2017, for the achievement of gravitational waves detection, he received:

• The Special Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics,^[27]
• Gruber Prize in Cosmology,^[28]
• Shaw Prize,^[29]
• Kavli Prize in Astrophysics^[30]
• The Harvey Prize together with Kip Thorne and Ronald Drever.^[31]
• The Smithsonian magazine's American Ingenuity Award in the Physical Science category, with Kip Thorne and Barry Barish.^[32]
• The Willis E. Lamb Award for Laser Science and Quantum Optics, 2017.^[33]
• Princess of Asturias Award (2017) (jointly with Kip Thorne and Barry Barish).^[34]
• The Nobel Prize in Physics (2017) (jointly with Kip Thorne and Barry Barish)^[4]
• Fellowship of the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters^[35]

• In 2018, he was awarded the American Astronomical Society's Joseph Weber Award for Astronomical Instrumentation "for his invention of the interferometric gravitational-wave detector, which led to the first detection of long-predicted gravitational waves."^[36]
• In 2020 he was elected a Legacy Fellow of the American Astronomical Society.^[37]

• Weiss, R.; Stroke, H.H.; Jaccarino, V.; Edmonds, D.S. (1957). "Magnetic Moments and Hyperfine Structures Anomalies of Cs₁₃₃, Cs₁₃₅ and Cs₁₃₇". Phys. Rev. 105 (2): 590–603. Bibcode:1957PhRv..105..590S. doi:10.1103/PhysRev.105.590.
• R. Weiss (1961). "Molecular Beam Electron Bombardment Detector". Rev. Sci. Instrum. 32 (4): 397–401. Bibcode:1961RScI...32..397W. doi:10.1063/1.1717386.
• R. Weiss & L. Grodzins (1962). "A Search for a Frequency Shift of 14.4 keV Photons on Traversing Radiation Fields". Physics Letters. 1 (8): 342. Bibcode:1962PhL.....1..342W. doi:10.1016/0031-9163(62)90420-1.
• Weiss, Rainer (1963). "Stark Effect and Hyperfine Structure of Hydrogen Fluoride". Phys. Rev. 131 (2): 659–665. Bibcode:1963PhRv..131..659W. doi:10.1103/PhysRev.131.659.
• R. Weiss & B. Block (1965). "A Gravimeter to Monitor the _OS_O Dilational Model of the Earth". J. Geophys. Res. 70 (22): 5615. Bibcode:1965JGR....70.5615W. doi:10.1029/JZ070i022p05615.
• R. Weiss & G. Blum (1967). "Experimental Test of the Freundlich Red-Shift Hypothesis". Phys. Rev. 155 (5): 1412. Bibcode:1967PhRv..155.1412B. doi:10.1103/PhysRev.155.1412.
• R. Weiss (1967). "Electric and Magnetic Field Probes". Am. J. Phys. 35 (11): 1047–1048. Bibcode:1967AmJPh..35.1047W. doi:10.1119/1.1973723.
• R.Weiss and S. Ezekiel (1968). "Laser-Induced Fluorescence in a Molecular Beam of Iodine". Phys. Rev. Lett. 20 (3): 91–93. Bibcode:1968PhRvL..20...91E. doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.20.91.
• R. Weiss & D. Muehlner (1970). "A Measurement of the Isotropic Background Radiation in the Far Infrared". Phys. Rev. Lett. 24 (13): 742. Bibcode:1970PhRvL..24..742M. doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.24.742.
• R. Weiss (1972). "Electromagnetically Coupled Broadband Gravitational Antenna" (PDF). Quarterly Progress Report, Research Laboratory of Electronics, MIT. 105: 54.
• R. Weiss & D. Muehlner (1973). "Balloon Measurements of the Far Infrared Background Radiation". Phys. Rev. D. 7 (2): 326. Bibcode:1973PhRvD...7..326M. doi:10.1103/PhysRevD.7.326.
• R. Weiss & D. Muehlner (1973). "Further Measurements of the Submillimeter Background at Balloon Altitude". Phys. Rev. Lett. 30 (16): 757. Bibcode:1973PhRvL..30..757M. doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.30.757.
• R. Weiss & D.K. Owens (1974). "Measurements of the Phase Fluctuations on a He-Ne Zeeman Laser". Rev. Sci. Instrum. 45 (9): 1060. Bibcode:1974RScI...45.1060O. doi:10.1063/1.1686809.
• R. Weiss, D.K. Owens & D. Muehlner (1979). "A Large Beam Sky Survey at Millimeter and Submillimeter Wavelengths Made from Balloon Altitudes". Astrophysical Journal. 231: 702. Bibcode:1979ApJ...231..702O. doi:10.1086/157235.
• Weiss, R.; Downey, P.M.; Bachner, F.J.; Donnelly, J.P.; Lindley, W.T.; Mountain, R.W.; Silversmith, D.J. (1980). "Monolithic Silicon Bolometers". Journal of Infrared and Millimeter Waves. 1 (6): 910. doi:10.1364/ao.23.000910. PMID 18204660.
• R. Weiss (1980). "Measurements of the Cosmic Background Radiation". Annual Review of Astronomy and Astrophysics. 18: 489–535. Bibcode:1980ARA&A..18..489W. doi:10.1146/annurev.aa.18.090180.002421.
• R. Weiss (1980). "The COBE Project". Physica Scripta. 21 (5): 670. Bibcode:1980PhyS...21..670W. doi:10.1088/0031-8949/21/5/016. S2CID 250836076.
• R. Weiss, S.S. Meyer & A.D. Jeffries (1983). "A Search for the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich Effect at Millimeter Wavelengths". Astrophys. J. Lett. 271: L1. Bibcode:1983ApJ...271L...1M. doi:10.1086/184080.
• Weiss, R.; Halpern, M.; Benford, R.; Meyer, S.; Muehlner, D. (1988). "Measurements of the Anisotropy of the Cosmic Background Radiation and Diffuse Galactic Emission at Millimeter and Submillimeter Wavelengths". Astrophys. J. 332: 596. Bibcode:1988ApJ...332..596H. doi:10.1086/166679.
• R. Weiss, J.C. Mather, E.S. Cheng, R.E. Eplee Jr., R.B. Isaacman, S.S. Meyer, R.A. Shafer, E.L. Wright, C.L. Bennett, N.W. Boggess, E. Dwek, S. Gulkis, M.G. Hauser, M. Janssen, T. Kelsall, P.M. Lubin, S.H. Moseley Jr., T.L. Murdock, R.F. Silverberg, G.F. Smoot and D.T. Wilkinson (1990). "A Preliminary Measurement of the Cosmic Microwave Background Spectrum by the Cosmic Background Explorer (COBE) Satellite". Astrophys. J. 354: L37. Bibcode:1990ApJ...354L..37M. doi:10.1086/185717.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
• R. Weiss, G. Smoot, C. Bennett, R. Weber, J. Maruschak, R. Ratliff, M. Janssen, J. Chitwood, L. Hilliard, M. Lecha, R. Mills, R. Patschke, C. Richards, C. Backus, J. Mather, M. Hauser, D. Wilkenson, S. Gulkis, N. Boggess, E. Cheng, T. Kelsall, P. Lubin, S. Meyer, H. Moseley, T. Murdock, R. Shafer, R. Silverberg and E. Wright (1990). "COBE Differential Microwave Radiometers: Instrument Design and Implementation". Astrophys. J. 360: 685. Bibcode:1990ApJ...360..685S. doi:10.1086/169154.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
• R. Weiss (1990). "Interferometric Gravitational Wave Detectors". In N. Ashby; D. Bartlett; W. Wyss (eds.). Proceedings of the Twelfth International Conference on General Relativity and Gravitation. Cambridge University Press. pp. 331. ISBN 9780521384285.
• R. Weiss, D. Shoemaker, P. Fritschel, J. Glaime and N. Christensen (1991). "Prototype Michelson Interferometer with Fabry-Perot Cavities". Applied Optics. 30 (22): 3133–8. Bibcode:1991ApOpt..30.3133S. doi:10.1364/AO.30.003133. PMID 20706365.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)

• List of Jewish Nobel laureates

• Cho, A. (August 5, 2016). "The storyteller". Science. 353 (6299): 532–537. doi:10.1126/science.353.6299.532. PMID 27493164.
• Mather, J.; Boslough, J. (2008). The very first light: The true inside story of the scientific journey back to the dawn of the universe. Basic Books. ISBN 978-0-465-01576-4.
• Bartusiak, M. (2000). Einstein's unfinished symphony: Listening to the sounds of space-time. Joseph Henry Press. ISBN 978-0-425-18620-6.

• Media related to Rainer Weiss at Wikimedia Commons
• Rainer Weiss's website at MIT
• LIGO Group at the MIT Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research
• Rainer Weiss at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
• Q&A: Rainer Weiss on LIGO's origins at news.mit.edu
• Archived at Ghostarchive and the Wayback Machine: "UW Frontiers of Physics Lecture: Dr. Rainer Weiss, Fall 2016, recorded October 25, U. Washington College of Arts & Sciences". YouTube. November 10, 2016.
• Rainer Weiss on Nobelprize.org including the Nobel Lecture 8 December 2017 LIGO and Gravitational Waves I