Dr. Robert Wagoner

Biography

Robert V. Wagoner's scientific direction began in 1960 when he attended a series of lectures by British astrophysicist Fred Hoyle on cosmology. At that time, he was an undergraduate in mechanical engineering at Cornell University, where he received his Bachelor of Mechanical Engineering in 1961. He was born and raised in Teaneck, New Jersey, where he had a major interest in golf, leading the Cornell golf team. Wagoner switched to physics at Stanford University, earning a Master of Science in Engineering Science in 1962 and a Ph.D. in Physics in 1965. He worked as a postdoctoral fellow at Caltech, collaborating with William Fowler and Hoyle to complete calculations on the abundances of elements produced in the primordial universe. Over the years, he returned to Cornell as a faculty member in the astronomy department before finally becoming a professor in the Physics Department at Stanford, where he is now an emeritus member of the Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology.

Research Interests

Experience

Courses