Jeremiah Paul "Jerry" Ostriker (/ˌoʊˈstraɪkər/ oh-STRY-kər;[3] born April 13, 1937) is an American astrophysicist and a professor of astronomy at Columbia University[4][5] and is the Charles A.
Young Professor Emeritus at Princeton, where he also continues as a senior research scholar.
Ostriker has been very influential in advancing the theory that most of the mass in the universe is not visible at all, but consists of dark matter.
[8][9] His research has also focused on the interstellar medium, galaxy evolution, cosmology and black holes.
On June 20, 2013 Ostriker was given the White House Champions of Change Award for his role in initiating the Sloan Digital Sky Survey project, which makes all of its astronomical data sets available publicly on the Internet [10] Ostriker is also known for the Ostriker–Peebles criterion, relating to the stability of galactic formation.