Massimo (Max) Gaspari
Astrophysicist
Ph.D.
I am an Astrophysicist and Astronomer who has been working for two decades mainly in the theoretical/computational field focusing on the formation and evolution of galaxies and groups/clusters of galaxies, and their co-evolution with supermassive black holes. I enjoy studying the astrophysics of active galactic nuclei (AGN) feeding/feedback, diffuse plasmas, and multiphase gas. I often develop and carry out 3D high-resolution MHD simulations with massively parallel supercomputers (>10k cpus/gpus), and use first-principle simulations as controlled astrophysical experiments to understand a large range of multiwavelength observations (X-ray, optical/IR, radio). At the same time, I work closely with observational researchers and large collaborations to probe and constrain the diverse range of developed quantitative physical models of galaxies and black holes.
Research Activity
α Theoretical & Numerical Astrophysics: formation and evolution of galaxies, groups, clusters.
β Astrophysics of (supermassive) black holes and accreting objects.
γ Multiphase gas astrophysics: instabilities, warm filaments, molecular clouds, dust, metals.
δ AGN feedback (jets, outflows, radiation) versus cooling flows and star formation.
ε Astrophysical plasmas (ICM, IGrM, CGM/ISM): MHD, turbulence, conduction, shocks.
ζ Quantitative comparison with multiwavelength observations (X-ray, optical/IR, radio).
Research Methods
η High-resolution 3D magneto-hydrodynamic simulations.
θ Independent developer of several physical and numerical modules (e.g., for FLASH).
κ Adaptive mesh refinement and cloud-in-cell particles (dark matter, stars, BHs).
λ Massive parallelization and optimization for HPC supercomputers (e.g., NASA Pleiades).
Research Portfolio
• 150 publications: 6800+ citations; h-index 49
• $6.9 million funding + 128 million CPU-hrs ($2.7 million) allocated
• 62 invited talks and colloquia (100+ presentations)
• 105 accepted observing programs (~300 proposals)