Albion Lawrence

Quantum gravity, quantum field theory, quantum information, planetary fluids, physical oceanography

Overview

I divide my time between topics relevant to planetary climate and topics in quantum field theory and quantum gravity

Planetary Climates

I am a member of the Astrophysics and Geophysics Group at Brandeis, and a Visiting Associate in Environmental Science and Engineering at Caltech.

Physical Oceanography

  • Analysis and interpretation of satellite altimetry data
  • Upper ocean turbulence
  • Near-Inertial Waves and Internal Gravity Waves

Geophysical Fluid Dynamics

  • Novel characterizations of geophysical turbulence
  • Hamiltonian methods
  • Field theory techniques

Current advisees

  • Dr. Jack Skinner (PhD 2022, Queen Mary University). Joint Brandeis-Caltech postdoc co-advised by Joern Callies working on novel analysis techniques for satellite altimetry.

Quantum Field theory and Quantum Gravity

I am a member of the Quantum and Gravitational Theory Group at Brandeis.

Quantum information and quantum gravity

  • Open quantum systems
  • Entanglement of non-spatial degrees of freedom
  • Quantum Black Holes
  • Gauge/gravity duality

Quantum Field Theory and Cosmology

  • Axion models of inflation
  • Quantum field theory of inflation
  • Constraints and effects of quantum gravity on models of cosmology and particle physics

Current advisees

  • Martin Sasieta (PhD 2022, IFT Madrid), Postdoc.
  • Connor Wolfe, PhD student.

Former advisees

Undergraduate Students

  • Ian Shoemaker, 2004-2005, Brandeis U. Thesis: “Decoherence and Inflation”. Associate Professor of Physics, Virginia Tech.
  • Matthew Roberts, 2004-2005, Brandeis U. Thesis: “PT-symmetric quantum mechanics”. Assitant Professor, POSTECH, Korea.
  • Benson Way, 2007-2008, Brandeis U. Thesis: “Axion constraints and string-wall dynamics”. Postdoc at University of Barcelona.
  • Kabir Husain, 2008-2009. Thesis: “Semiclassical and quantum dynamics of the Coulomb potential in one dimension”. Lecturer in Physics and Astronomy, University College London.
  • Samuel McCandlish, 2011-2012. Thesis: “Bending and Breaking Time Contours: A World Line Approach to Quantum Field Theory”. Cofounder, Anthropic.
  • Skyler Kasko, 2013-2014. Thesis: “Coarse Grained Quantum Dynamics”.
  • Stefan Stanojevic, 2014-2015. Thesis: “The large-N $O(N)$ model on hyperbolic space”. Senior Machine Learning Scientist, Flagship Pioneering.
  • Aaron Fogel, 2018-2019. Thesis: “Corrections to molecular dynamics in the Born-Oppenheimer Approximation”. Researcher in quantum information for the military.
  • Yunfei Wang, 2021. Thesis: “Open system dynamics with a Hagedorn bath.” PhD student, University of Maryland.

Graduate Students

  • Tobias Sander, Brandeis U. PhD, 2007. Senior Manager, Berg Lund and Company, Hamburg, Germany.
  • Nathaniel Reden, Brandeis U. PhD, 2014. Instructor in Physics and Mathematics, Bancroft School, Worcester, MA.
  • Cesar Agon, Brandeis U., PhD, 2017. Postdoc at Centro Atomico Bariloche, Argentina.
  • Andrew Rolph, Brandeis U., PhD, 2020. Postdoc at the University of Amsterdam.
  • Harsha Hampapura, Brandeis U., 2016-2024. Winter 2024: Associate Scientist, National Center for Atmospheric Research.
  • Jonathan Harper, Brandeis U., 2016-2022. Fall 2022: postdoc at Yukawa Institute, University of Kyoto.
  • Alastair Grant-Stuart, Brandeis U., 2016-2022. Fall 2022: postdoc at University of Nottingham.

Postdocs

  • Prof. Martin Kruczenski (PhD, Buenos Aires U., Argentina), 2003-2005. Professor of physics, Purdue Univ.
  • Prof. Amit Sever (PhD, Hebrew U., Israel), 2005-2008. Faculty, School of Physics and Astronomy, Tel Aviv University.
  • Prof. Marco Aldi (PhD, Northwestern U), 2010-2012. (FRG postdoc in Mathematics). Associate professor of mathematics, Virginia Commonwealth University.
  • Prof. Masoud Soroush (PhD, Stanford University), 2013-2015. Assistant professor of physics at Coppin State Univ.
  • Dr. Ida Zadeh (PhD, University of Toronto), 2013-2016. Postdoc at the International Center for Theoretical Physics, Trieste, Italy.
  • Dr. Bogdan Stoica (PhD, Caltech), 2016-2019. Postdoc at Northwestern.
  • Dr. Djordje Radicevic (PhD, Stanford), 2019-2022. Quantitative researcher, Citadel Securities.