Ed Cackett (ew1397)

Office of the Dean, Physics and Astronomy

Office of the Dean, 2155 OId Main
Physics, 337 Physics Research Building

• Associate Dean for Research and Graduate Studies, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Wayne State University, July 2024 onwards
• Distinguished Service Professor, Wayne State University, June 2024 onwards
• Chair, Department of Physics & Astronomy, Wayne State University, August 2023 - July 2024
• Interim chair, Department of Physics & Astronomy, Wayne State University, August 2022 - July 2023
• Professor, Wayne State University, August 2022-June 2024
• Associate professor, Wayne State University, 2016-2022
• Assistant professor, Wayne State University, 2012-2016
• Postdoctral research fellow, Institute of Astronomy, University of Cambridge, 2010-2011
• Schlumberger research fellow, Darwin College, University of Cambridge, 2010-2011
• Chandra fellow, University of Michigan, 2008-2010
• Dean MacLaughlin postdoctoral fellow, University of Michigan, 2006-2008

Astrophysics of compact objects (neutron stars and black holes), more specifically:

• Accretion across the mass scale: from neutron stars and black holes in X-ray binaries to Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN)
• Accretion disks around supermassive black holes
• Reverberation mapping in AGN (optical, UV and X-ray) and X-ray binaries (X-ray)
• Reflection and reverberation in neutron star low-mass X-ray binaries
• Observational probes of the neutron star dense matter equation of state (neutron star radii and masses)
• Accretion at low rates and quiescent emission from neutron star low-mass X-ray binaries

• Press-release and link to Nature cover article I co-authored (01/10/2019): Black hole research involving WSU astronomer makes front cover of Nature.
• Press-releases (31 May 2012) from NASA and ESA about a paper I co-authored.

• Ph.D., University of St Andrews, UK, 2007
• M. Sci., University of Durham, UK, 2003

• WSU Career Development Chair (2017)
• WSU Department of Physics & Astronomy Richard J. Barber Faculty Recognition Award (2017)
• NSF CAREER award (2014)
• Wayne State Academy of Scholars, Junior Faculty Award (2015)
• Sultana N. Nahar Prize for Distinction in Research in Physics and Astronomy, Wayne State University (2019)

As of January 2025: 222 articles published in peer-reviewed journals.

An up-to-date lists of publications can be found using the following links:

• NASA ADS
• arXiv

• More than 12,800 total citations
• h-index: 64 (as of January 2025)