Omer Blaes

Blaes was born April 30, 1961. He completed a BSc with first class honors in astrophysics at Queen Mary University of London in August 1983. He earned a MPhil in physics, cum laude, from the International School for Advanced Studies (SISSA) in October 1985. He completed a DPhil in physics at SISSA in September 1986. His doctoral advisor was Marek Abramowicz. Blaes' dissertation was titled The Stability of Thick Accretion Disks. Blaes was the Chaim Weizmann Research Fellow in Theoretical Physics at California Institute of Technology from October 1, 1986 to September 30, 1989. He was research associate at the Canadian Institute for Theoretical Astrophysics from October 12, 1989 to August 31, 1993.[1]

On September 1, 1993, Blaes became an assistant professor in the department of physics at University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB). He became an associate professor in 1998 and a professor at UCSB on July 1, 2004. Blaes served as chair of the UCSB physics department from July 1, 2010 to June 30, 2013.[1] His research focuses on theoretical astrophysics and compact objects.

Omer oversees the outlist of the committee for sexual-orientation and gender minorities in astronomy of the American Astronomical Society.[2]

Blaes came out as gay at the age of 28 while he was a postdoctoral researcher in Toronto. Blaes was married to his husband before the 2008 California Proposition 8.[2]