Neil Turok
Encyclopedia
Neil Geoffrey Turok is the Director of Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics
. He is the son of Mary and Ben Turok
, activists in the anti-apartheid movement and the African National Congress
.
, one of the inventors of superstring theory
. After a postdoctoral post at Santa Barbara, he was an associate scientist at Fermilab
, Chicago. In 1992 he was awarded the Maxwell medal
of the Institute of Physics
for his contributions to theoretical physics. In 1994 he was appointed Professor of Physics at Princeton University
, then held the Chair of Mathematical Physics at the University of Cambridge
starting in 1997. He was appointed Director of the Perimeter Institute in 2008.
. In the early 1990s, his group showed how the polarisation and temperature anisotropies of the cosmic background radiation would be correlated, a prediction which has been confirmed in detail by recent precision measurements by the WMAP spacecraft. They also developed a key test for the presence of a cosmological constant
, also recently confirmed. Turok and collaborators developed the theory of open inflation. With Stephen Hawking
, he later developed the so-called Hawking-Turok instanton solutions which, according to the no-boundary proposal of Hawking and James Hartle
, can describe the birth of an inflationary universe.
Most recently, with Paul Steinhardt
at Princeton, Turok has been developing a cyclic model
for the universe, in which the big bang is explained as a collision between two "brane-worlds" in M theory. The predictions of this model are in agreement with current cosmological data, but there are interesting differences with the predictions of cosmological inflation which will be probed by future experiments (probably by Planck (spacecraft)). In 2006, Steinhardt and Turok showed how the cyclic model could naturally incorporate a mechanism for relaxing the cosmological constant
to very small values, consistent with current observations. Steinhardt and Turok co-authored the recent popular science book "Endless Universe".
In 2003, Turok founded the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences
in Muizenberg
, a postgraduate educational centre supporting the development of mathematics and science across the African continent.
Prize for his work in mathematical physics and in establishing the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences
in Muizenberg
. He also received a "Most Innovative People Award," for Social Innovation, at the World Summit on Innovation and Entrepreneurship (WSIE) in 2008.
On May 9, 2008 Mike Lazaridis
announced that Turok would become the new Executive Director of the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics
starting on October 1, 2008.
On June 14, 2011 Turok received an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Ottawa.
On November 3, 2011 Turok was selected to deliver the Massey Lectures
for the 2012 season. This honor involves five separate lectures to be delivered in various locations across Canada in October of 2012, aired on CBC's Ideas (radio show)
shortly thereafter. The prestigious Massey Lectures
have become an annual highlight of Canada's national intellectual life over the past 50 years.
Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics
Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics is an independent, resident-based research institute devoted to foundational issues in theoretical physics located in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. Perimeter Institute was founded in 1999 by Mike Lazaridis...
. He is the son of Mary and Ben Turok
Ben Turok
Ben Turok is a former anti-apartheid activist and current South African member of parliament and a member of the African National Congress.He was born in Latvia in 1927 and came with his family to South Africa in 1934. He graduated from the University of Cape Town in 1950...
, activists in the anti-apartheid movement and the African National Congress
African National Congress
The African National Congress is South Africa's governing Africanist political party, supported by its tripartite alliance with the Congress of South African Trade Unions and the South African Communist Party , since the establishment of non-racial democracy in April 1994. It defines itself as a...
.
Career
After graduating from Churchill College, Cambridge, Turok gained his doctorate from Imperial College, London, under the supervision of Professor David OliveDavid Olive
David Olive CBE FLSW FRS, is a British theoretical physicist. Olive made fundamental contributions to the string theory and duality theory. He was Professor of physics at Imperial College, London...
, one of the inventors of superstring theory
Superstring theory
Superstring theory is an attempt to explain all of the particles and fundamental forces of nature in one theory by modelling them as vibrations of tiny supersymmetric strings...
. After a postdoctoral post at Santa Barbara, he was an associate scientist at Fermilab
Fermilab
Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory , located just outside Batavia, Illinois, near Chicago, is a US Department of Energy national laboratory specializing in high-energy particle physics...
, Chicago. In 1992 he was awarded the Maxwell medal
Maxwell Medal and Prize
The Maxwell Medal and Prize is one of the principal awards made annually by the Institute of Physics. The award is made for outstanding contributions to theoretical physics and is intended to recognize theoretical physicists early in their careers....
of the Institute of Physics
Institute of Physics
The Institute of Physics is a scientific charity devoted to increasing the practice, understanding and application of physics. It has a worldwide membership of around 40,000....
for his contributions to theoretical physics. In 1994 he was appointed Professor of Physics at Princeton University
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
, then held the Chair of Mathematical Physics at the University of Cambridge
University of Cambridge
The University of Cambridge is a public research university located in Cambridge, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest university in both the United Kingdom and the English-speaking world , and the seventh-oldest globally...
starting in 1997. He was appointed Director of the Perimeter Institute in 2008.
Research
Turok has worked in a number of areas of mathematical physics and early universe physics, focusing on observational tests of fundamental physics in cosmologyPhysical cosmology
Physical cosmology, as a branch of astronomy, is the study of the largest-scale structures and dynamics of the universe and is concerned with fundamental questions about its formation and evolution. For most of human history, it was a branch of metaphysics and religion...
. In the early 1990s, his group showed how the polarisation and temperature anisotropies of the cosmic background radiation would be correlated, a prediction which has been confirmed in detail by recent precision measurements by the WMAP spacecraft. They also developed a key test for the presence of a cosmological constant
Cosmological constant
In physical cosmology, the cosmological constant was proposed by Albert Einstein as a modification of his original theory of general relativity to achieve a stationary universe...
, also recently confirmed. Turok and collaborators developed the theory of open inflation. With Stephen Hawking
Stephen Hawking
Stephen William Hawking, CH, CBE, FRS, FRSA is an English theoretical physicist and cosmologist, whose scientific books and public appearances have made him an academic celebrity...
, he later developed the so-called Hawking-Turok instanton solutions which, according to the no-boundary proposal of Hawking and James Hartle
James Hartle
James Burkett Hartle is an American physicist. He has been a professor of physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara since 1966, and he is currently a member of the external faculty of the Santa Fe Institute...
, can describe the birth of an inflationary universe.
Most recently, with Paul Steinhardt
Paul Steinhardt
Paul J. Steinhardt is the Albert Einstein Professor of Science at Princeton University and a professor of theoretical physics. He received his B.S. at the California Institute of Technology and his Ph.D. in Physics at Harvard University...
at Princeton, Turok has been developing a cyclic model
Cyclic model
A cyclic model is any of several cosmological models in which the universe follows infinite, self-sustaining cycles. For example, the oscillating universe theory briefly considered by Albert Einstein in 1930 theorized a universe following an eternal series of oscillations, each beginning with a...
for the universe, in which the big bang is explained as a collision between two "brane-worlds" in M theory. The predictions of this model are in agreement with current cosmological data, but there are interesting differences with the predictions of cosmological inflation which will be probed by future experiments (probably by Planck (spacecraft)). In 2006, Steinhardt and Turok showed how the cyclic model could naturally incorporate a mechanism for relaxing the cosmological constant
Cosmological constant
In physical cosmology, the cosmological constant was proposed by Albert Einstein as a modification of his original theory of general relativity to achieve a stationary universe...
to very small values, consistent with current observations. Steinhardt and Turok co-authored the recent popular science book "Endless Universe".
In 2003, Turok founded the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences
African Institute for Mathematical Sciences
The African Institute for Mathematical Sciences is a tertiary education and research institute in Muizenberg, South Africa, established in September 2003...
in Muizenberg
Muizenberg
Muizenberg is a beach-side suburb of Cape Town, South Africa. It is situated where the shore of the Cape Peninsula curves round to the east on the False Bay coast...
, a postgraduate educational centre supporting the development of mathematics and science across the African continent.
Awards and honors
He was awarded the 2008 TEDTED (conference)
TED is a global set of conferences owned by the private non-profit Sapling Foundation, formed to disseminate "ideas worth spreading"....
Prize for his work in mathematical physics and in establishing the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences
African Institute for Mathematical Sciences
The African Institute for Mathematical Sciences is a tertiary education and research institute in Muizenberg, South Africa, established in September 2003...
in Muizenberg
Muizenberg
Muizenberg is a beach-side suburb of Cape Town, South Africa. It is situated where the shore of the Cape Peninsula curves round to the east on the False Bay coast...
. He also received a "Most Innovative People Award," for Social Innovation, at the World Summit on Innovation and Entrepreneurship (WSIE) in 2008.
On May 9, 2008 Mike Lazaridis
Mike Lazaridis
Mihalis "Mike" Lazaridis , OC, O.Ont is a Greek Canadian businessman. He is the founder and co-CEO of Research In Motion , which created and manufactures the BlackBerry wireless handheld device. He is also a former chancellor of the University of Waterloo, and an Officer of the Order of Canada...
announced that Turok would become the new Executive Director of the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics
Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics
Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics is an independent, resident-based research institute devoted to foundational issues in theoretical physics located in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. Perimeter Institute was founded in 1999 by Mike Lazaridis...
starting on October 1, 2008.
On June 14, 2011 Turok received an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Ottawa.
On November 3, 2011 Turok was selected to deliver the Massey Lectures
Massey Lectures
The Massey Lectures are an annual week-long series of lectures on a political, cultural or philosophical topic given in Canada by a noted scholar. They were created in 1961 to honour Vincent Massey, Governor General of Canada...
for the 2012 season. This honor involves five separate lectures to be delivered in various locations across Canada in October of 2012, aired on CBC's Ideas (radio show)
Ideas (radio show)
Ideas is a long running scholarly radio documentary show on CBC Radio One. Co-created by Phyllis Webb and William A. Young, the show premiered in 1965 under the title The Best Ideas You'll Hear Tonight...
shortly thereafter. The prestigious Massey Lectures
Massey Lectures
The Massey Lectures are an annual week-long series of lectures on a political, cultural or philosophical topic given in Canada by a noted scholar. They were created in 1961 to honour Vincent Massey, Governor General of Canada...
have become an annual highlight of Canada's national intellectual life over the past 50 years.
External links
- Neil Turok's home page
- African Institute for Mathematical Sciences
- Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics
- NextEinstein
- Neil Turok interviewed by Tina Košir and Alan Macfarlane 19 February 2008 (film)
- Video of Neil Turok moderating the "Quantum to Cosmos" opening discussion panel at Perimeter Institute, with Katherine FreeseKatherine FreeseDr. Katherine Freese, a theoretical astrophysicist, is the George Eugene Uhlenbeck Collegiate Professor of Physics at the University of Michigan and Associate Director of the Michigan Center for Theoretical Physics. She is known for her work in theoretical cosmology at the interface of particle...
, Leo KadanoffLeo KadanoffLeo Philip Kadanoff is an American physicist. He is a professor of physics at the University of Chicago and a former President of the American Physical Society . He has contributed to the fields of statistical physics, chaos theory, and theoretical condensed matter physics.-Biography:Kadanoff...
, Lawrence Krauss, Sean M. CarrollSean M. CarrollSean Michael Carroll is a senior research associate in the Department of Physics at the California Institute of Technology. He is a theoretical cosmologist specializing in dark energy and general relativity...
, Anton ZeilingerAnton ZeilingerAnton Zeilinger is an Austrian quantum physicist. He is currently professor of physics at the University of Vienna, previously University of Innsbruck. He is also the director of the Vienna branch of the Institute for Quantum Optics and Quantum Information IQOQI at the Austrian Academy of Sciences...
, Gino Segrè, Andrew WhiteAndrew WhiteAndrew White may refer to:*Andrew Dickson White, American diplomat, author and educator*Andrew G. White, Australian scientist and educator*Andrew White , Anglican minister known as the 'vicar of Baghdad'*Andrew White...
, and David TongDavid Tong (mathematician)David Tong is a professor of theoretical physics at DAMTP in Cambridge, a fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, and joint recipient of the 2008 Adams Prize... - Neil Turok's lecture "PI: Past, Present and Future" at the Quantum to Cosmos festival
- Neil Turok's panel discussion, "State of the Universes" with Katherine FreeseKatherine FreeseDr. Katherine Freese, a theoretical astrophysicist, is the George Eugene Uhlenbeck Collegiate Professor of Physics at the University of Michigan and Associate Director of the Michigan Center for Theoretical Physics. She is known for her work in theoretical cosmology at the interface of particle...
and Lawrence Krauss at the Quantum to Cosmos festival - Neil Turok on The Agenda with Steve Paikin: "Do We Still Believe in Science?" panel discussion with Natalie AngierNatalie AngierNatalie Angier is a nonfiction writer and a science journalist for the New York Times.- Life :...
, Michael D. GriffinMichael D. GriffinMichael Douglas Griffin is an American physicist and aerospace engineer. From April 13, 2005 to January 20, 2009 he served as Administrator of NASA, the space agency of the United States...
, Nadia El-Awady and Stewart BrandStewart BrandStewart Brand is an American writer, best known as editor of the Whole Earth Catalog. He founded a number of organizations including The WELL, the Global Business Network, and the Long Now Foundation...
, at the Quantum to Cosmos festival.