Edward Fomalont
American astronomer / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Edward Fomalont (born May 14, 1940) is an American scientist working at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory. He specializes in radio galaxies, X-ray binary systems, astrometry, and general relativity. He has published more than 330 papers in peer-reviewed journals and proceedings of scientific conferences.[1]
In 1975, Fomalont and Richard Sramek made a first radio-interferometric occultation experiment to test the theory of general relativity by measuring the bending of microwave radiation in the gravitational field of the Sun.[2] Fomalont and colleagues made the most precise VLBI test of general relativity in 2005 that had reached precision of few parts in 10,000.[3]
In 2002, Fomalont and Sergei Kopeikin claimed to have measured the speed of gravity in the dedicated experiment[4][5] by observing the tangential component in the gravitational bending of light of a quasar caused by the orbital motion of Jupiter with respect to the barycenter of the solar system.[6] This claim was disputed[7] but vigorously defended by Kopeikin and Fomalont in a number of subsequent publications.[8][9][10]
Fomalont is an active participant in many international radio interferometric projects including the VLBI Space Observatory Programme and Square Kilometre Array.