Cumrun Vafa
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 |
A major contributor to this article appears to have a conflict of interest with its subject. It may require cleanup to comply with Wikipedia's content policies, particularly neutral point of view. Please discuss further on the talk page. (March 2009) |
 |
This article contains weasel words, vague phrasing that often accompanies biased or unverifiable information. Such statements should be clarified or removed. (March 2009) |
| Cumrun Vafa | |
 |
|
| Born | 1960 Tehran |
|---|---|
| Nationality | Iranian-American |
| Fields | Physics |
| Institutions | Harvard University |
| Alma mater | MIT, Princeton University |
| Doctoral advisor | Ed Witten |
| Notable awards | Dirac Medal, Eisenbud Prize |
Cumrun Vafa کامران وفا (pronounced [kɔːmˈrɔːn væˈfɔː] in Persian; born 1960 in Tehran) is an Iranian-American leading string theorist from Harvard University where he started as a Harvard Junior Fellow. He is a recipient of the 2008 Dirac Medal.
Contents |
[edit] Birth and education
Cumrun Vafa was born in Tehran, Iran in 1960. He graduated from Alborz High School and went to the US in 1977. He got his undergraduate degree from MIT with a double major in math and physics. He received his Ph.D. from Princeton University in 1985 under the supervision of Edward Witten. He then became a junior fellow at Harvard, where he later got a junior faculty position. In 1989 he was offered a senior faculty position, and he has been there ever since. Currently, he is the Donner Professor of Science at Harvard University.[1]
[edit] Research and achievements
Cumrun Vafa is a leading string theorist. His research area is theoretical particle physics and he does research on the nature of quantum gravity and the relation between geometry and quantum field theories. The discovery of Strominger and Vafa that the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy of a black hole can be accounted for by solitonic states of superstring theory is higly cited and also is the relation between geometry and field theories that arise through string dualities, a topic known as "geometric engineering of quantum field theories". In 1997, he developed F-theory.
He is also interested in understanding the underlying meaning of string dualities, as well as trying to apply superstring theory to some unsolved questions of elementary particle physics such as the hierarchy problem and the cosmological constant problem.
He has published numerous articles on topological string theories, and he is famous for his landmark paper with Andy Strominger about the microscopic origin of the black hole entropy.
He is also a trustee of Network of Iranians for Knowledge and Innovation (NIKI).
