Rainer Weiss

Rainer "Rai" Weiss (; ; September 29, 1932 – August 25, 2025) was a German-born American physicist of partly Jewish descent (his father was Jewish). He was known for his works in gravitational physics and astrophysics.

Works
He was a professor of physics emeritus at MIT. He was best known for inventing the laser interferometric technique, which is the basic operation of LIGO.

Weiss was Chair of the COBE Science Working Group. 

In 2017, Weiss was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics, along  with Kip Thorne and Barry Barish, "for decisive contributions to the LIGO detector and the observation of gravitational waves".

Death
Weiss died at a hospital in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on August 25, 2025, at the age of 92.

References

Other websites


 Rainer Weiss's website at MIT
 LIGO Group at the MIT Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research

Category:1932 births
Category:2025 deaths
Category:American astrophysicists
Category:Massachusetts Institute of Technology faculty
Category:American astronomers
Category:American Nobel Prize winners
Category:Massachusetts Institute of Technology alumni
Category:Naturalized citizens of the United States
Category:Refugees from Nazism
Category:Scientists from Berlin
Category:Nobel Prize in Physics winners