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

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

, where he held a professorship in astrophysics and a

fellowship A fellow is a concept whose exact meaning depends on context. In learned or professional societies, it refers to a privileged member who is specially elected in recognition of their work and achievements. Within the context of higher education ...

at St Peter's College. He studied

physics Physics is the natural science that studies matter, its 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 which r ...

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 natural phenomena. This is in contrast to experimental physics, which uses experim ...

St John's College, Cambridge St John's College is a Colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge founded by the House of Tudor, Tudor matriarch Lady Margaret Beaufort. In constitutional terms, the college is a charitable corpo ...

and received his PhD in

radio astronomy Radio astronomy is a subfield of astronomy that studies celestial objects at radio frequencies. The first detection of radio waves from an astronomical object was in 1933, when Karl Jansky at Bell Telephone Laboratories reported radiation coming f ...

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

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

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 j ...

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 university press of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world, and its printing history dates back to the 1480s. Having been officially granted the legal right to print books ...

. On 27 August 2013, the LOFAR 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 ...

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