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Originally posted by taog
I really don' tknow much about black holes, but find it very interesting that you study them for a living. What do you do exactly?
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I do theoretical work in general relativity. So I don't go looking for black holes etc., but work out their (expected) properties, and things related to that.
Recently, I've been looking into the gravitational self-force/radiation reaction problem. An accelerated object will emit gravitational radiation (like a charge will emit light). This carries away energy, so the object will feel a force due to its own radiation. It turns out to be very difficult to work this out properly, but its understanding it has a lot of interesting implications.
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Also, most of this type of astronomy isn't funded by the government. A lot of it is worked on by profs and students. The students pay the prof's wages, so the students are paying for the research on said topics to be done.
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You're right that most of these sorts of things are studied at universities, but a large chunk of their money ultimately comes from the government.