Rutgers Professor Involved in Nobel Prize Winning Physics Project

About 13 years ago, Saurabh Jha was a 22-year-old graduate student at Harvard, assisting scientists Brian P. Schmidt and Adam G. Riess in studying a form of star called supernovae.

The High-z Supernova Search Team specialized in searching for a rare form of exploding star, called a "1a Supernovae."

According to Jha, the key point of this star is that it is believed that when the star reaches the end of its life, it explodes the same way every time, giving off the same amount of light.

By mapping these stars, Jha said that the group was able to determine that the universe is expanding faster than previously thought.

On Oct. 4, the work put into the project was rewarded with the Nobel Prize in Physics being awarded to Schmidt and Riess.

"It was really exciting to me," Jha said. "It's really been a revolution in our understanding (of) the universe."

Jha said the original team working on the project, the findings of which were presented in 1998, have moved onto other projects, but he and Schmidt continue to collaborate.

More recently, the two used the Hubble Space Telescope to continue mapping Supernovae in even further reaches of the universe, he said.

Jha, 35,  currently teaches an introduction to astronomy course at Rutgers University.

He graduated East Brunswick High School in 1992, received his undergraduate degree in physics and mathematics from Harvard University in 1996, and his doctorate in astronomy from Harvard in 2002, according to the University.