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Chushiro Hayashi (林 忠四郎, Hayashi Chūshirō, July 25, 1920 – February 28, 2010) was a Japanese astrophysicist. Hayashi tracks on the Hertzsprung–Russell diagram are named after him.

He earned his B.Sc in physics at the Imperial University of Tokyo in 1942. He then worked as a research associate under Hideki Yukawa at Kyoto University. He made additions to the big bang nucleosynthesis model that built upon the work of the classic Alpher–Bethe–Gamow paper. Probably his most famous work was the astrophysical calculations that led to the Hayashi tracks of star formation, and the Hayashi limit that puts a limit on star radius. He was also involved in the early study of Brown dwarfs, some of the smallest stars formed. He retired in 1984.

He won the Eddington Medal in 1970, the Kyoto Prize in 1995, and the Bruce Medal in 2004.

Chushiro Hayashi died from pneumonia at a Kyoto hospital on February 28, 2010.