Prof. Andrzej Trautman passed away.
Dear Colleagues,
It is with deep regret to announce that on February 27, 2026, Professor Andrzej Trautman passed away at the age of 93.
His intellectual courage and mathematical precision made it possible to demonstrate that gravitational waves can exist, and his passing marks the end of an era in theoretical physics. Yet the legacy he leaves behind remains a living foundation of our modern understanding of the Universe. Andrzej Trautman made his mark on the history of science above all by resolving one of Albert Einstein’s greatest dilemmas. In 1958, as a young scientist, he proved theoretically that gravitational waves were not merely a mathematical curiosity, but a real physical phenomenon: they carry energy and information and therefore can be detected. These works, later complemented by the famous Robinson–Trautman solutions describing radiating gravitational waves, became one of the key theoretical foundations for the creators of the LIGO and Virgo detectors, leading to the groundbreaking discovery of gravitational waves.
His life journey, from the dramatic experiences of the Warsaw Uprising, through postwar education in Paris, to his return to a rebuilding Warsaw, shaped a figure of remarkable personal culture and broad intellectual horizons. After earning his Master of Science in Engineering degree at the Faculty of Telecommunications of the Warsaw University of Technology, he began his doctoral studies under the supervision of Leopold Infeld and Jerzy Plebański at the Institute of Physics of the Polish Academy of Sciences. After receiving his PhD in physics, he worked from 1961 until 2004 at the Institute of Theoretical Physics of the University of Warsaw. He frequently undertook short and long-term research visits abroad; particularly significant was his 1961 stay at Syracuse University, where in the relativity group led by Peter Bergmann he began scientific collaboration with Ivor Robinson and Roger Penrose. At the invitation of Chen-Ning Yang, he lectured for two years at Stony Brook University.
Professor Trautman was a valued lecturer and mentor. He not only built the Polish school of relativity at the University of Warsaw, but also served as a pillar of Polish scientific life as a full member and Vice President (1978–1980) of the Polish Academy of Sciences. He was an honorary member of the Polish Physical Society. His engagement in the work of the Committee on Physics of the Polish Academy of Sciences and numerous scientific councils left a lasting mark on the organization and prestige of Polish science during challenging transitional years.
The Professor’s international authority made him a citizen of the global scientific community. His lectures at King’s College London became a legendary inspiration for such giants as Roger Penrose. For years he maintained exceptionally close ties with SISSA (International School for Advanced Studies) in Trieste, where as a visiting professor he helped shape the European elite of mathematical physics. There, in an atmosphere of intellectual freedom, he developed ideas that united the purest mathematics with fundamental physics. In the later period of his research career, Professor Trautman turned toward the deep structures of differential geometry. He was fascinated by the geometric foundations of field theory, which led him to advanced studies of group theory and fiber bundles. Within this current of research were his important works on Yang-Mills field theory. With great insight, he analyzed the mathematical architecture of these theories, drawing inspiration from the achievements of Chen-Ning Yang and translating them into the language of modern geometry. For Trautman, gravity, elementary particles, and geometry formed an inseparable whole, which he described with rare elegance.
Tomek Bulik, on behalf of the POLGRAW group