Max Pettini

Max Pettini was born in 1949 in Rome, Italy. His mother was a homemaker (with a law degree) and his father a film producer. Pettini recalls being interested in the sciences from early childhood. He owned a microscope, and his idea of fun reading material was an encyclopedia. Even so, he adds, “I was not one of those kids who got a telescope at age eight.” But then his parents subscribed to a series of pictorial books on the sciences produced by Life magazine. An issue called “The Universe” made an indelible impression. “I remember sitting there going Wow,” he says. “It blew my mind.”

Pettini moved to the U.K. in 1969 to study at University College London. He received his PhD in Astrophysics in 1978. Two years later he joined the Royal Greenwich Observatory as a research astronomer (and, eventually, head of research for two years, until 1998). At times during that same period he also held the positions of visiting lecturer at the University of Sussex and principal research scientist at the Anglo-Australian Observatory. Since then he has continued to occupy multiple, simultaneous academic positions. Since 1998 he has been a professor of observational astronomy at the Institute of Astronomy, University of Cambridge; since 2006 a visiting professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at University College London; and since 2009 a visiting professor at the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research at the University of Western Australia.

The recognition of Pettini’s accomplishments include, among others, the presidency of the Cambridge Astronomical Association, a fellowship in the Royal Society, an honorary fellowship at University College London, and the Herschel Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society. He has co-authored well over two hundred peer-reviewed papers, which cumulatively have received more than 35,000 citations.