Gabor Kunstatter

BSc, MSc, PhD

Gabor Kunstatter is a highly reputed scientist, scholar, teacher, and administrator. He is considered an authority in gravitation theory, especially in the areas of black hole physics and quantum gravity. He has served in a range of academic positions — including as departmental Chair and the Dean of Science — while teaching, supervising students, and doing research with rigour.

Kunstatter’s research on exotic black holes shed light on fundamental problems of gravitation theory and also serves as a testing ground to study interactions between gravity and quantum fields in extreme conditions. His work illuminates the fundamental problem of gravity that has been puzzling theoreticians for the past century.

Kunstatter is well regarded in the international physics community. He has co-edited seven proceedings of national and international conferences and authored 138 journal papers, including his highly cited single-authored paper “d-Dimensional Black Hole Entropy from Quasi-Normal Modes,” which was published in the prestigious Physical Review Letters and established his scientific mark. A second-year physics textbook that he wrote will be published this year.

During his career, Kunstatter received an impressive total of $1.27 million for theoretical physics, via Discovery Grants from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC). He has nationally influenced his field by serving as president of the Canadian Association of Physicists and chairing the Space and Astronomy NSERC review committee.

Most notably, Kunstatter has been influential to many undergraduate, graduate, doctoral, and post-doctoral students. With his blend of sharp wit, clear exposition, and genuine concern for the welfare of his students, Kunstatter provided them with opportunities to conduct research and he encouraged them to publish early in their careers. The training of new researchers is one of his most enduring contributions as a scientist — many of Kunstatter’s students have succeeded all over the world.

In appreciation of his scholarly work, teaching, university service, and knowledge mobilization, The University of Winnipeg is proud to honour Gabor Kunstatter as Professor Emeritus.