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Birth of Ellis
George Ellis was born on 11 August 1939 in Johannesburg, South Africa.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_F._R._Ellis -
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Education
George Francis Rayner Ellis attended the University of Cape Town, where he graduated with honors in 1960 with a Bachelor of Science degree in physics with distinction. He represented the university in fencing, rowing and flying. He then attended Cambridge University, where he received a PhD in applied maths and theoretical physics in 1964, he was on college rowing teams. -
Edu
At Cambridge, Ellis served as a research fellow from 1965 to 1967, was assistant lecturer in the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics until 1970, and was then appointed university lecturer, serving until 1974.
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Work Years
Ellis became a visiting professor at the Enrico Fermi Institute at the University of Chicago in 1970, a lecturer at the Cargese Summer School in Corsica in 1971 and the Erice Summer School in Sicily in 1972, and a visiting H3 professor at the University of Hamburg, also in 1972. -
First Large Impact Book
He co-authored The Large Scale Structure of Space-Time with University of Cambridge physicist Stephen Hawking. This book, along with Stephen Hawking, was a major shift in the way cosmologists viewed the cosmos.
https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/large-scale-structure-of-spacetime/1E6B961EC9878EDDBBD6AC0AF031CC93 -
Recognition
In 1974, Ellis is recognized as one of the worlds leaders in theoretical cosmologists. After releasing his book with Stephen Hawkin in 1973, Ellis and Hawkin were at the top of the scientific community with their theories on the cosmos and their expansion on Einsteins theory of relativity. -
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Leader In His Field
From 1989 to 1992 he served as president of the International Society on General Relativity and Gravitation. This organization studies and promotes the study of general relativity and gravitation. -
Awards
In 2004, after years of research and teaching, Ellis won the prestigious Templeton Prize. The moto of the Templeton Prize organization is "whose exemplary achievements advance Sir John Templeton’s philanthropic vision: harnessing the power of the sciences to explore the deepest questions of the universe and humankind’s place and purpose within it." Mother Theresa was the first to receive this prize.
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Sociology of Physics
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Honors
In 2019 Rhodes University in Grahamstown announced it would award Ellis an honorary doctorate in laws.