Prof. Mario Santos, is the South African Research Chair in Cosmology with Multi-Wavelength Data a position held jointly at UWC, SAAO and AIMS.

He completed his undergraduate studies at the University of Lisbon, obtained his  Master’s from Cambridge University and his PhD from Oxford University.

His main area of research is Cosmology. In particular, he is studying how the next generation of large radio telescopes, such as MeerKAT  in South Africa and the future SKA will be able to answer fundamental questions in Cosmology, from the nature of dark energy or the physics of the primordial Universe to the process of Reionization when the first stars and galaxies of the Universe were born.  This research involves both analytical models and large scale numerical simulations as well as a good understanding of the telescopes setup. The huge volumes of data that will be provided by these experiments also allow for unique and exciting ways to develop novel statistical analysis techniques.

Experiments in which his is currently involved: MeerKAT, SKA, PAPER, LOFAR, ASKAP, APERTIF, EUCLID.