Professor of Physical Sciences Michael J Church is Head of the X-ray Binaries Group at Birmingham working in the fields of neutron star, black hole binaries and Galactic jet sources. He holds a leading position internationally in the fields of absorption dipping, and in the most luminous X-ray binaries having proposed physical models for these sources and for the formation of relativistic jets in neutron star binaries.
Professor of Physical Sciences Michael J Church was awarded the degree of Ph D in 1975 in the field of plasma physics. In 1989, in the department of Electron Physics and Space Research he worked on the Spacelab 2 mission in which an X-ray telescope was flown on-board the Space Shuttle.
He was Visiting Professor at the Institute of Space & Astronautical Science (ISAS), Japan (1995), Royal Society Visitor at ISAS (1996-99), invited member of the Beppo-SAX core programme (1997-99); Visiting Astronomer, Laboratory for High Energy Astrophysics, Greenbelt MA (1997); Visiting Astronomer, Space Science division of ESTEC, Holland (1997-2000). In 2000, he became by invitation Professor in High Energy Astrophysics at the Jagiellonian University, Cracow; Professor in the Astronomical Observatory, Cracow (2001-2008); Visiting Professor of the Jagiellonian University (2009-10).
In 2009 he was awarded the permanent title of State Professor by the President of Poland for scientific achievement.
Selected:
Church M J, Balucinska-Church M., A Complex Continuum Model for the Low Mass X-ray Binary Dipping Sources, A&A, 300, 441, 1995
Balucinska-Church M., Church M. J., Discovery of a Red- and Blue-shifted Iron Disk Line in the Galactic Jet Source GRO J1655-40, MNRAS, 312, L55, 2000
Church M. J., Halai, G. S., Balucinska-Church M., An explanation of the Z-track Sources, A&A, 460, 233, 2006
Balucinska-Church M., Gibiec A., Jackson N. K., Church M. J., On the Nature of the Cygnus X-2 like Z-track Sources, A&A, 512, 9, 2010