Włodzimierz Kluźniak

Włodzimierz Kluźniak's photo

Degree: Professor

Position: Professor

Division: Astrophysics II (Warsaw)

ORCID: 0000-0001-9043-8062

Office: 131

Phone: +48 223296131

E-mail: wlodek@camk.edu.pl

Włodzimierz (Włodek) Kluźniak is a professor at the Nicolaus Copernicus Astronomical Center (CAMK) in Warsaw.


His academic career is closely linked to both American and Polish institutions. In 1988 he obtained his PhD at Stanford University, after which, in 1987-1991 he was a postdoctoral fellow at Columbia University, and in 1992-1999 a faculty member in the Physics Department of University of Wisconsin-Madison, where in 1994-1995 he was a Sloan Research Fellow. In 2002/2003 held a Poste Rouge du CNRS at CESR (Toulouse). Instrumental in creating the Physics and Astronomy Department of the University of Zielona Góra, and a professor there 2001-2009. Since 2009 he has worked as a professor at CAMK, where he has been holding a tenured position since 1992.


He is a member of the High Energy Stereoscopic System (H.E.S.S.) and the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA) projects.


Prof. Kluźniak is interested in the high energy astrophysics of neutron stars and black holes. He did early work on eclipsing pulsars, gamma-ray bursts, and high frequency oscillations of accretion disks (kHz QPOs). His current focus is on radiative magnetohydrodynamic simulations of accretion in general relativity (GRRMHD).


A list of and links to his publications are available from the NASA ADS database.


During his career, Prof. Kluźniak has supported and monitored the work of many young scientists. He was the PhD advisor of 3 PhD students at University of Wisconsin and 4 at CAMK: Dr. Bhupendra Mishra (Los Alamos National Laboratory, USA); Dr. Varadarajan Parthasarathy (Höchstleistungsrechenzentrum Stuttgart); Dr. Ananda Deepika Bollimpalli (Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics, Germany); Dr. David Abarca. Currently he advises 3 doctoral students at CAMK: Ruchi Mishra; Fatemeh Kayanikhoo; Angelos Karakonstantakis.


Research interests
  • neutron stars,
  • pulsars,
  • black holes,
  • gamma ray bursts,
  • accretion theory,
  • relativistic astrophysics.

Grants / Scientific projects
Prof. Kluźniak was/is the principal investigator of the following recent projects:
  • "Simulations of luminous and stable black hole accretion disks" (2020-2024). Funding information: PRELUDIUM BIS grant, NCN (2019/35/O/ST9/03965),
  • "From Transitional Pulsars to ULXs - radiation, jets, and outflows in accreting neutron stars" (2020-2024). Funding information: OPUS grant, NCN (2019/33/B/ST9/01564),
  • "Variable accretion flows" (2013-2018). Funding information: MAESTRO grant, NCN (2013/08/A/ST9/00795).