Nigel Weiss | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | Nigel Oscar Weiss (1936-12-16)16 December 1936[2] |
| Died | 24 June 2020(2020-06-24) (aged 83)[3] |
| Alma mater | Clare College, Cambridge |
| Known for | flux expulsion |
| Awards |
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| Scientific career | |
| Institutions | University of Cambridge |
| Thesis | Variable Hydromagnetic Motions (1961) |
| Doctoral advisor | Edward Bullard[1] |
| Doctoral students | |
| Website | Nigel Weiss's home page |
Nigel Oscar WeissFRS[4] (16 December 1936 – 24 June 2020)[2][3] was anastronomer and mathematician, and leader in the field of astrophysical and geophysicalfluid dynamics. He wasEmeritus Professor of MathematicalAstrophysics at theUniversity of Cambridge.[5][6][7]
Born in South Africa, Weiss studied atHilton College,Natal,Rugby School andClare College, Cambridge, and had been a fellow of Clare College since 1965. He read for his PhD in 1961 with a thesis on Variable Hydromagnetic Motions.[1]
In 1987 he became Professor of Mathematical Astrophysics at the University of Cambridge.
Between 2000 and 2002 he was President of theRoyal Astronomical Society, and in 2007 was awarded theGold Medal, the society's highest award.[5]
Weiss published extensively in the field of mathematical astrophysics, specialising in solar andstellar magnetic fields, astrophysical and geophysicalfluid dynamics and nonlineardynamical systems.[5]
In 1966 he was the first to demonstrate and describe the process of 'flux expulsion' by which a conducting fluid undergoing rotating motion acts to expel the magnetic flux from the region of motion, a process now known to occur in thephotosphere of theSun and other stars.[8]
Weiss was elected a Fellow of theRoyal Society (FRS) in 1992.[2] His nomination reads
Professor Weiss is distinguished for his work in the theory of convection, for developing appropriate numerical techniques, and for pioneering their use in precise numerical experiments to gain a qualitative and comprehensive understanding of the behaviour of complicatednonlinear systems. Among many notable achievements in this field, he has been instrumental in the identification of a period-doubling route to chaos in a system of partial differential equations describing doubly-diffusive convection. He has made wide-ranging studies of the magneto-convective processes occurring in the Sun and similar stars. In early work of lasting influence, he analysed the process ofmagnetic flux expulsion and the mechanism of concentration ofmagnetic field into ropes from whichfluid motion is excluded. In recent work, he has initiated a program of research in the field of nonlinear compressible convection, an important step towards realistic modelling of stellar convection zones.[9]
