What to know about MIT professor Nuno Loureiro and the investigation into his shooting
Authorities are searching for a suspect in the killing of Nuno FG Loureiro, a prominent physics professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who was shot to death at his home near Boston. Loureiro, a 47-year-old married Portuguese man, was shot Monday night and died Tuesday at a local hospital.
Authorities have not revealed a possible motive and no suspects were in custody as of Wednesday morning, the Norfolk County District Attorney’s Office said.
The shooting in Brookline, Massachusetts, comes days after a deadly attack at another prestigious area school, Brown University, where police also have not identified the suspect who killed two students and injured nine others. The FBI said there was no connection between the two crimes.
Loureiro joined MIT in 2016 and was named last year to lead the school’s Plasma Science and Fusion Center, one of its largest laboratories. The center has approximately 250 researchers working in seven buildings and focuses on advancing clean energy technologies and other research.
The professor grew up in Viseu, central Portugal, studied in Lisbon and earned a doctorate in London, according to the university. Before joining MIT, he worked at a nuclear fusion research institute in Lisbon.
Loureiro studied plasma behavior and worked to explain the physics behind astronomical phenomena such as solar flares. His research, according to his obituary on the MIT news site, “involved the design of fusion devices capable of harnessing the energy of molten plasmas, thereby bringing the dream of clean, nearly limitless fusion power closer to reality.”
“It is not hyperbole to say that MIT is the place to go for solutions to humanity’s greatest problems,” Loureiro told the school’s news site when he became director of the plasma laboratory. “Fusion energy will change the course of human history.”
“He shone brightly as a mentor, friend, teacher, colleague and leader, and was universally admired for his articulate and compassionate manner,” Dennis Whyte, an engineering professor who previously directed MIT’s Plasma Science and Fusion Center, told a campus publication.
Deepto Chakrabarty, William AM Burden Professor of Astrophysics and head of the Department of Physics, described him as a “champion of plasma physics,” a valued colleague and an inspiring mentor to graduate students.
MIT President Sally Kornbluth said “the shocking loss for our community comes during a time of worrying violence in many other places.”
The Portuguese president’s office also issued a statement of condolences calling Loureiro’s death “an irreparable loss for science and for all those with whom he worked and lived.”
The investigation into Loureiro’s killing unfolds as Brown University, about 50 miles away in Providence, Rhode Island, continues to recover from Saturday’s campus shooting. As the search for the suspect enters its fifth day Wednesday, authorities urged the public to review security camera or cellphone footage from the week before the attack, saying they believe the shooter may have surveyed the area before.
