Scientific background

I am a Professor of Physics at Brandeis University, where I am a member of the Quantum and Gravitational Theory Group and the Astrophysics and Geophysics group.

My research is in theoretical physics construed broadly, with an eye to connections between disparate areas of physics. My training and the bulk of my past work was in string theory, quantum field theory, and applications of these to cosmology.

In recent years I have also been working on problems in physical oceanography, geophysical fluid dynamics, and the physics of climate.

History

I received my A.B. in Physics in 1991 at the University of California, Berkeley, where I worked for Prof. Paul Richards on instrumentation for balloon-borne cosmic microwave background observations, and did an undergraduate thesis under Prof. Mahiko Suzuki on the theory of neutrino oscillations. I received my PhD in Physics in 1996 at the University of Chicago under the supervision of Prof. Emil Martinec, doing research on string theory and black holes. I held postdoctoral positions at Harvard University, the Institute for Advanced Study, and SLAC/Stanford University, working in quantum field theory, string theory, particle physics, and cosmology. In 2022 I began as faculty at Brandeis where I have been ever since, including a stint as Physics Department Chair in 2018-2021. I currently serve on the Faculty Senate, representing the Division of Science.

I begain working in physical oceanography during a sabbatical in 2018 at MIT’s department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences. For the 2023-24 academic year, I was on leave as a Visiting Associate in the Environmental Sciences and Engineering Program at Caltech, courtesy of a Simons Foundation Pivot Fellowship, where I was embedded in Joern Callies’ Ocean Physics group.