Professor Steven Balbus (Shaw Prize 2013) explains his work on black hole formation. Interview with University of Oxford mathematician Dr Tom Crawford recorded at the Hong Kong Laureate Forum 2023.

Steven discusses his reaction at being awarded the prize in 2013, before a detailed explanation of his influential work on accretion disks, and how the magnetic field around a black hole can be understood by considering a spring between rotating masses. We also discuss his position at the University of Oxford as the Savilian Professor of Astronomy, and why he decided to work in astrophysics. Finally, Steven answers some quick-fire questions includng "blackboards versus whitebaords", "pi vs tau", "angles versus radians", "favourite number", "favourite star" and "favourite mathematical result".

Links to Tom's other interviews with Laureates in Maths and Computer Science.

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Whitfield Diffie:    • Discovery of Public Key Cryptography ...  
Lesley Lamport:    • Ig Nobel Prize with Leslie Lamport (2...  
Alessio Figalli:    • Maths Career of Alessio Figalli (2018...  
Martin Hairer:    • Playing Tetris with Martin Hairer (Fi...  
Michael Atiyah:    • Sir Michael Atiyah and his Love of Maths  
Daniel Spielman:    • Solving the Hardest Problems with Dan...  
Efim Zlemanov:    • Why Do People Hate Mathematics? Efim ...  

Produced by Dr Tom Crawford at the University of Oxford. Tom is Public Engagement Lead at the Oxford University Department of Continuing Education: https://www.conted.ox.ac.uk/

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With thanks to
Steven Balbus
Hong Kong Laureate Forum
Dan Addison
ESA/Hubble
Tudor
ESO
EHT Collaboration
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/Jeremy Schnittman
Gary Settles
Josh Estey/AUSaid
WHOI
Simons Centre
Peter Mercator
MVLAN
Berkeley
The Wire
Rogelio Bernal Andreo
ESO/P. Kervella