Prof. Heino Falcke, Professor of Astroparticle Physics and Radio Astronomy at Radboud University in Nijmegen, received a Spinoza prize on June 6.

The Spinoza Prize, which is awarded by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO), is the highest Dutch scientific award. Prof. Falcke has been given the award, worth 2,5 million euros, for his scientific research on black holes and cosmic particles.

Heino Falcke studies black holes, perhaps the most mysterious objects in the universe. The gravity in a black hole is so intense that even light cannot escape.

Matter in a black gap is transformed into energy with unparalleled efficiency. But as yet we know little about how black holes work.

Source: Radboud University Nijmegen

Simulation of the supermassive black hole at the centre of our galaxy by Charles Gammie, University of Illinois.