Astronomy, Astrophysics and Cosmology have historically been among the very strongest scientific disciplines in Cambridge.
The opening of the new Battcock Centre for Experimental Astrophysics represents a major consolidation of these disciplines. Until five years ago, astronomers, astrophysicists and cosmologists at the Institute of Astronomy, the Cavendish Laboratory and the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics (DAMTP) were significantly geographically separated.
The Chancellor of the University, Lord Sainsbury of Turville (pictured right), was joined at the opening by the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz and the chief benefactor who made the building possible, Mr Humphrey Battcock (pictured left).
Humphrey Battcock is a Cavendish Laboratory and Downing College alumnus who has been an enthusiastic supporter of the University’s initiatives since the beginning of the present Cavendish redevelopment programme.
His gift, together with funding from the Wolfson Foundation, has been matched by the University to enable the centre to become a reality.
The construction of the Battcock Centre for Experimental Astrophysics brings together on the same site the experimental astrophysicists from the Cavendish Laboratory with astronomers from the IoA and Kavli Institute, completing the consolidation of the research efforts of the Institute of Astronomy and the Cavendish Laboratory.
The consolidation will also promote collaboration with members of DAMTP in the areas of cosmology and exoplanets.
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Reproduced courtesy of the University of Cambridge
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New centre for experimental astrophysics opens at Cambridge
28 October 2013
A new building on the Institute of Astronomy site off Madingley Road will complete the consolidation of astronomy, astrophysics and cosmology on a single site in Cambridge.