Authorities were working Wednesday to uncover clues after a prominent professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology was fatally shot at his home near Boston. Nuno F.G. Loureiro, a 47-year-old physicist and fusion scientist, was shot Monday night at his home in Brookline, Massachusetts. He died at a local hospital. Loureiro, who joined MIT in 2016, was named last year to lead MIT's Plasma Science and Fusion Center, where he aimed to advance clean energy technology and other research. The center, one of the school's largest labs, had more than 250 people working across seven buildings when he took the helm. "It's not hyperbole to say MIT is where you go to find solutions to humanity's biggest problems," Loureiro said when he was named to lead the plasma science lab. "Fusion energy will change the course of human history." A neighbor of Loureiro's who did not want to be identified told CBS News Boston he heard "three loud bangs" Monday evening. "I thought at first it was somebody in our apartment kicking in a door or something so I called the neighbors and they said no they thought it was gunshots," he said. A 22-year-old student at Boston University who lives near Loureiro's apartment in Brookline told The Boston Globe she also heard three loud noises Monday evening and feared it was gunfire. "I had never heard anything so loud, so I assumed they were gunshots," Liv Schachner was quoted as saying.