| Personal Information |
Date of
birth: 1 May, 1957
Citizenship: USA & UK |
| Present Position |
Chancellor's
Distinguished Professorship in Physics, University of California
San Diego
Affiliated Professor: Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering,
Bioengineering, Halicioglu Data Science Institute (UCSD). |
|
Address
Awards and
Honors
|
University of
California San Diego, Department of Physics, 9500 Gilman Drive,
MC 0319, La Jolla CA 92903, USA
JD Crawford
Memorial Lecture, University of Pittsburgh (2025)
Elected Fellow of the Royal Society (UK) (2024)
Welsh Lecturer, University of Toronto, Canada (2022)
Presidential Medallion of the University of Illinois (2021)
Infosys-ICTS Chandrasekhar Lectures, Bangalore (2020)
American Physical Society Leo P. Kadanoff Prize (2020)
Primakoff Lecture, University of Pennsylvania (2020)
Dashen Memorial Lecture, UCSD (2019)
Mark Kac Lecture, Los Alamos National Laboratory (2019)
APS Outstanding Referee (2019)
Arnold Sommerfeld Lectures, Ludwig Maximilians University,
Munich (2018)
Sowers Symposium Lecturer, Virginia Technical University
(2017)
Marshall N. Rosenbluth Lecture, Festival de Theorie, France
(2017)
Tau Beta Pi Daniel C. Crucker Eminent Faculty Award, UIUC
(2017)
Elected Professor, Center for Advanced Study, UIUC (2013)
Elected Fellow of Institute of Physics, UK (2011)
Elected Member, US National Academy of Sciences (2010)
Elected Fellow, American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2010)
Rosenqvist Lecturer, University of Oslo (2010)
Swanlund Endowed Chair (2007 - present)
Norman Hascoe Distinguished
Lecturer, University of Connecticut (2008)
Arthur O. Williams Lecturer, Brown University (2008)
A.E. Nordsieck Award for Excellence in Graduate Teaching
(2001)
APS Centennial Speaker (1999)
Elected Fellow of the American Physical Society (1995)
National Science Foundation Creativity Award (1997)
University Scholar of the University of Illinois (1994-1997)
Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Fellow (1987-1991)
Xerox Award for Junior Faculty Research (1991)
Distinguished Visiting Lecturer, McMaster University (1989)
Beckman Fellow at the Center for Advanced Study, Urbana (1988)
Exhibitioner, Pembroke College (1976)
Numerous appearances on the
University of Illinois Incomplete List of Teachers Ranked
Excellent
|
| Professional Experience |
2021-present
2013-2021 |
Chancellor's Distinguished Professor of Physics,
University of California San Diego
Director, Center for Universal Biology -- A NASA
Astrobiology Institute @ UIUC |
|
2007-2021
|
Swanlund Endowed Chair and Center for Advanced
Study Professor of Physics, University of Illinois at
Urbana-Champaign |
|
2005-2021 |
Leader, Biocomplexity Group, Institute for
Genomic Biology |
| 2003 |
Senior
Visitor, DAMTP, University of Cambridge |
| 1995-2021 |
Professor
of Physics, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign |
| 1996 |
Founder,
NumeriX LLC |
| 1991-1995 |
Associate
Professor, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign |
| 1985-1991 |
Assistant
Professor, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign |
| 1988 |
Visiting
Scientist, Stanford University |
| 1982-1985 |
Postdoc,
Insititute for Theoretical Physics, Santa Barbara |
| 1979-1982 |
Graduate
student, Cavendish Laboratory, Cambridge |
| 1976-1979 |
Undergraduate,
Pembroke College, Cambridge |
| 1976
|
Research
Assistant, National Physical Laboratory, England |
|
| Research Interests |
Dynamics of
pattern forming systems, multi-scale modeling, phase transitions
kinetics, front propagation, turbulence, renormalization group
theory for differential equations and singular perturbations,
critical phenomena, disordered systems, high temperature
superconductivity, polymers and liquid crystals, computational
finance, evolutionary biology, ecology, quantitative epidemiology,
foundations of machine learning.
Research continually
funded by the National Science Foundation from 1985-2025, by
NASA, the US Department of Energy, the Simons Foundation
and the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative.
|
| Selected professional
activities |
APS Buckley
Prize Committee (2025-2026)
UK Physics of Life Network Roadmap (2024-2026)
Academic Advisory Committee, Academia Sinica, Taiwan
(2023-present)
Chair, Section 33 Applied Physical Sciences, National Academy of
Sciences (2017-2020)
APS Early Career Soft Condensed Matter Prize Committee (2019)
APS Investment Committee (2018-2021)
Member, NAS Comstock Prize Committee (2013)
Editorial Board of The Philosophical Transactions of the Royal
Society (2009-present)
Member, APS Oliver E. Buckley Prize Committee (2009)
Editorial Board of Communications in Applied Mathematics and
Computational Science (2008-present)
Reviewer, New directions for
understanding systemic risk. (Fed Res. NY/NAS report, 2007)
Organiser, Program on Pattern Formation in Physics and Biology,
KITP
UC Santa
Barbara, 2003.
International Advisory Committee, Renormalization Group 2000
Chair, APS Lars Onsager Prize Committee (1998)
Member, APS Lars Onsager Prize Committee (1997)
Editorial Board of International Journal of Theoretical and
Applied Finance (1996-present)
International Advisory Committee, Renormalization Group 1996
APS Division of Fluid Dynamics Program Committee (1995)
US Dept. of Energy Applied Mathematics Panel (1992)
Reviewer for Science, Nature, Physical Review
Letters and other journals; National Science Foundation,
Department of Energy, NASA, US-Israel Binational Science
Foundation and other government and private grant-awarding
agencies.
29
students supervised to Ph.D,
23 postdocs
|
| Education |
1979-1982
University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK
Ph.D Theoretical Physics
- Advisor:
Prof. Sir Sam Edwards, FRS
- Title:
Statistical Mechanics of Polymers in the Solid State
1976-1979
University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK
B.A. (Cantab) Natural Sciences, specialising in theoretical physics
|