Lisa Randall

Lisa Randall at TED 2006

Lisa Randall (born 18 June, 1962) is a leading theoretical physicist and expert on particle physics, string theory and cosmology. She works on several of the competing models of string theory in the quest to explain the fabric of reality, and was the first tenured woman in the Princeton University physics department and the first tenured woman theoretical physicist at MIT and Harvard University. Her work has attracted enormous interest and is among the most citied in all of science.

She studies particle physics and cosmology at Harvard University , where she is a professor of theoretical physics. Her research concerns elementary particles and fundamental forces, and has involved the study of a wide variety of models, the most recent involving [[extra dimensions of space. She has also worked on supersymmetry, Standard Model observables, cosmological inflation, baryogenesis, grand unified theories, general relativity, and string theory. Professor Randall recently completed a book entitled Warped Passages : Unraveling the Mysteries of the Universe's Hidden Dimensions, which was included in the New York Times' 100 notable books of 2005.

Randall earned her PhD from Harvard University and held professorships at MIT and Princeton University before returning to Harvard in 2001. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a fellow of the American Physical Society, and is a past winner of an Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Research Fellowship, a National Science Foundation Young Investigator Award, a DOE Outstanding Junior Investigator Award, and the Westinghouse Science Talent Search. In 2003, she received the Premio Caterina Tomassoni e Felice Pietro Chisesi Award, from the University of Rome, La Sapienza. In autumn, 2004, she was the most cited theoretical physicist of the previous five years. In 2006, she received the Klopsted Award from the American Society of Physics Teachers (AAPT). Prof Randall was featured in Seed Magazine 's “2005 Year in Science Icons ” and in Newsweek 's “Who's Next in 2006”. She has helped organize numerous conferences and has been on the editorial board of several major theoretical physics journals.

Randall is an alumna of Hampshire College Summer Studies in Mathematics and graduated from Stuyvesant High School in 1980, where she was a classmate of fellow physicist and science popularizer Brian Greene. Randall earned a BA from Harvard in 1983, and obtained her Ph.D. in particle physics in 1987 under the direction of Howard Georgi. Georgi considers her his all-time best student. She was made a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2004. Randall was featured in Newsweek magazine's "Who's Next" issue of January 2, 2006, as "one of the most promising theoretical physicists of her generation."

Randall's sister, Dana Randall, is a professor of computer science at Georgia Tech.

Ms. Randall was the subject of 'The Discover Interview' (pgs. 50-53) in the 2006 "The Future of Terrorism" issue. (Inexplicably, no month/volume/issue information is indicated in Discover magazine.)

Bibliography

• Randall, Lisa (2005). Warped Passages: Unraveling the Universe's Hidden Dimensions. Ecco. ISBN 0-06-053108-8.

External links

• Prof Randall's website at Harvard

• Reprinted Op-Ed from The New York Times of Sunday, September 18th 2005

• Lisa Randall's Edge Bio Page

• On Gravity, Oreos and a Theory of Everything

• Radio Interview from This Week in Science May 09, 2006 Broadcast

• Profile in Scientific American October 2005