Hamburg Institute for Advanced Study
Germany
fellow
Yuval Birnboim
2025-2026
Home institution
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Country of origin (home institution)
Israel
Discipline(s)
Sciences of the universe
Theme(s)
Future Studies
Fellowship dates
›
Biography
He completed his B.Sc. in Physics and Mathematics at Tel Aviv University, followed by a Ph.D. in Astrophysics in 2006 under the supervision of Prof. Avishai Dekel, focusing on galaxy formation and evolution. He then conducted postdoctoral research as an ITC Fellow at Harvard University.
Since 2019, he has served as an Associate Professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel. His research group, which investigates the circumgalactic medium and turbulence, includes senior scientists, postdoctoral fellows, and graduate students.
Research Project
Turbulence in Galactic Halos
While in Hamburg, Yuval Birnboim will develop and implement new numerical techniques for modeling turbulence using sub-grid techniques in hydrodynamic simulations. Due to its inherently multi-scale nature, turbulence cannot be fully resolved in large-scale simulations and must be approximated in sub-grid. Birnboim will adapt state-of-the-art Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) models—commonly used in engineering for aerodynamic and hydrodynamic analysis—to astrophysical contexts, where they have seen limited application.
Research Interests:
Galaxy formation; thermodynamic and hydrodynamic properties of halo gas; large-scale hydrodynamic simulations; analytic modeling; advanced non-equilibrium atomic physics