Dr Kavan Ratnatunga
He retired back to Lanka in 2005.
His current interest include increasing the information on Lanka on the Internet
via his domain lakdiva.org
Archeology with a special interest in Numismatics (coins.lakdiva.org),
and rare books on Lanka (books.lakdiva.org).
He writes Free lance to the Sunday Times of Sri Lanka.
He is President of the Sri Lanka Numismatic Society,
Librarian of Sri Lanka Philatelic Society,
and a committee member of the Archaeological Society of Sri Lanka.
He is a life member of the Sri Lanka Rationalist Association,
He is a member of the Internet Society of Sri Lanka
and a Life member of the Royal Asiatic Society of Sri Lanka.
He is President of the Astronomical Association of Lanka.
He is member of the International Astronomical Union (IAU), on behalf of which he was the chairman
of the International Year of Astronomy IYA2009 committee for Sri Lanka.
He is a visiting Lecturer on Astronomy (DE2410) at the University of Moratuwa at Katubedda,
on Space at the Defence Service Command and Staff College (DSCSC), Sapugaskanda
and on Digital Collections at the Post Graduate Institute of Archaeology (PGIAr) of the University of Kalaniya.
He gives Guest Lectures on Astronomy, Numismatics, and the Internet on invitation.
E-mail kavanr@gmail.com
Dr Kavan Ratnatunga studied at Royal College, Colombo.
He got a First Class BSc Honours Degree in Physics in 1976 from the University of Ceylon, Colombo.
He qualified as an astrophysicist, with a 1979 MS from University of Pittsburgh in USA,
and a 1983 PhD from Australian National University,
specializing in automated statistical analysis of astronomical data and digital images.
His 25 year career included research at
Institute of Advanced Study in Princeton (1984/86),
Dominion Astrophysical Observatory in Victoria Canada (1986/88),
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt (1989/91),
Space Telescope Science Institute
and Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore (1992/96),
and Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh (1996/2004).
Highlights of over 50 publications in refereed Journals included
the First in-situ sample of Field Halo K-giants in Galactic Halo (1983),
and the First
Quad Gravitational Lens discovered with NASA Hubble Space Telescope (1995).