Conor Dyson Successfully Defends his Thesis

Photo collage of Conor Dyson's after PhD defense reception.
Left: Vitor Cardoso and Conor Dyson celebrate the successful defense of Conor's PhD thesis. Right: Leor Barack, Conor Dyson, Thomas Sotiriou and Maarten van de Meent pose in front of the Niels Bohr Institute. Photos by Christine McGrath

Last Friday, 11th of September, Conor Dyson successfully defended his PhD thesis in the historic Auditorium A of the Niels Bohr Institute. He presented his dissertation, Motion Through Matter in Curved Space, showcasing his work on understanding the motion of asymmetric binary black hole inspirals in matter. Through his work, he devised new methods for calculating the response of dark matter and fluids around supermassive black holes in the presence of a small secondary perturber. This understanding, in turn, allowed him to establish the first-principles framework needed to consistently evolve these systems, opening a direct path forward for both the practical and theoretical study of motion through matter. His thesis was supervised by Maarten van de Meent and Vitor Cardoso.

The presentation and dissertation were examined by a committee consisting of Prof. Leor Barack (University of Southampton), Prof. Thomas Sotiriou (University of Nottingham), and Prof. Poul Henrik Damgaard (Niels Bohr Institute), followed by an hour of questioning on the thesis and presentation. Afterwards, friends, family, and colleagues gathered to celebrate the occasion.

Conor Dyson posing for a photo after having successfully defended his PhD thesis.
The newly minted Dr. Dyson. Photo by Luka Vujeva

Sept. 17, 2026, 2:36 p.m.