People

Prof. Enrico Ramirez-Ruiz, Founder/Director

Enrico Ramirez-Ruiz, professor of astronomy and astrophysics at UC Santa Cruz, is the Founder and Director of the Lamat Instiute. Established in 2010, the Lamat program gives undergraduate students, the majority of whom are women and individuals from historically marginalized groups, the opportunity to work with UCSC faculty and graduate students on research projects using some of the world’s most advanced computers. To date there are over 100 alumni of the Lamat program.

Ramirez-Ruiz, who holds the Vera Rubin Presidential Chair for Diversity in Astronomy, is a theoretical astrophysicist and a leading authority on some of the most dramatic events in the universe, such as collisions, mergers, and disruptions of stars—especially those involving compact objects like black holes, neutron stars, and white dwarfs. Using computer simulations to explore these transient phenomena, his research addresses fundamental questions in high-energy astrophysics and provides a framework for understanding the observational data coming from new telescopes, gravitational wave detectors, and astronomical surveys.