Alessandra Buonanno

Alessandra Buonanno is a Research Professor at the University of Maryland, College Park, and Director at the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics (Albert Einstein Institute) in Potsdam. Her primary affiliation is with the Department of Physics at UMD, and she holds honorary professorships at Humboldt University and Potsdam University. She leads the Astrophysical and Cosmological Relativity department at the Max Planck Institute.

Education: PhD in Physics from the University of Pisa (1996), following a Master's in Physics (Laurea, 1993). Postdoctoral work included stints at the Institut des Hautes Études Scientifiques (France), Caltech, and CNRS institutes in Paris.

Research focuses on gravitational physics, including theoretical and phenomenological aspects of gravitational waves, general relativity, and astrophysical applications. She contributed to the LIGO Scientific Collaboration's groundbreaking detection of gravitational waves, earning numerous accolades such as the Balzan Prize (2021), Dirac Medal (2021), and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize (2018).

Publications emphasize high-field superconducting magnets for particle colliders, quantum gravity, and gravitational wave modeling. She leads projects like the Muon Collider's magnet design and coordinates international collaborations in particle physics and cosmology.

Awards include the European Research Council's Synergy Grant (2024), Oskar Klein Medal (2023), and membership in prestigious academies like the US National Academy of Sciences and Leopoldina.

Service roles include roles on the Kavli Prize Committee, the LISA Consortium Board, and the European Space Agency's Voyage 2050 committee. She is a Principal Investigator for the LIGO collaboration and actively contributes to advancing quantum-resistant cryptography and superconducting technologies.