Roberto Cotesta

"When I was 5 years old I used to play with my LEGOs and build 'starships' with them. Whenever somebody asked me what job I wanted to do in the future, I always answered: 'I want to build starships.' Then during middle school I discovered informatics, and I loved it. My uncle taught me how to code in Visual Basic, and I was very proud of my crappy programs. So I became a computer nerd, and I decided that the job I wanted to do in the future was to be a software developer. At some point during high school for some health issues the doctor forbade me to use the computer. Suddenly I had a lot of free time! I decided to fill this free time learning to play guitar, powerlifting (It’s a true sport!) and more importantly reading a lot of books, including 'A Brief History of Time' by Stephen Hawking. That was the first time I heard about black holes and I thought they were cool. This book (together with others) convinced me that I wanted to study physics at university. During university I learned that black holes are even cooler than I originally thought, so I decided to study them during my PhD!"

Roberto Cotesta is a PhD student at the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics in Potsdam-Golm, and he loves that every day he can learn a different aspect of gravitational physics from a different member of the Institute. Roberto's research focuses on modeling gravitational-wave signals and on estimating the masses and spins of black holes and neutron stars detected by LIGO and Virgo. When he's not extracting the secrets of the universe, you can find Roberto listening to music, riding his bike, playing guitar, or reading a book. Two of his favorite books are "The Trial" by Franz Kafka and "Divine Comedy" by Dante Alighieri.