Vik Dhillon ORCID iD icon

Professor of Astrophysics

Dept of Physics & Astronomy
University of Sheffield
Sheffield S3 7RH
United Kingdom

Tel:      +44  114  222 4528

vik.dhillon at sheffield.ac.uk

  

Affiliated Researcher

Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias
38205 La Laguna
Tenerife
Spain

 

 


I am a Professor of Astrophysics and Head of the Astrophysics Research Group in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Sheffield, and an Affiliated Researcher at the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) on Tenerife. Prior to moving to Sheffield in 1998, I worked at the Royal Greenwich Observatory, first at Herstmonceux/University of Sussex, then on La Palma, and finally in Cambridge. I was awarded the Royal Astronomical Society Jackson-Gwilt Medal in 2013. From 2014-2019, I was an ERC Advanced Grant holder. I am currently an editor of the RAS Techniques and Instruments journal, and a member of ESO Council.

My primary research interests are in the field of close binary stars, in which at least one stellar component is a white dwarf, neutron star or black hole. This work has led me and my collaborators to develop a series of high-speed cameras, ULTRACAM, ULTRASPEC and HiPERCAM, as well as a robotic telescope on La Palma, pt5m. I am also interested in observing gravitational-wave sources in the Universe discovered by the LIGO Scientific Collaboration, most likely emitted by close binary stars. My effort in this area is currently focused on GOTO, a wide-field survey telescope we have developed on La Palma and in Australia that is searching for electromagnetic counterparts to gravitational-wave transients.