Sabine Hossenfelder | |
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Born | [1] | September 18, 1976
Nationality | German |
Alma mater | Goethe University Frankfurt |
Known for | Analog models of gravity |
Scientific career | |
Fields | Quantum gravity |
Institutions | Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies |
Sabine Hossenfelder (born 18 September 1976) is a German author and theoretical physicist who researches quantum gravity. She is a Research Fellow at the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies where she leads the Superfluid Dark Matter group. She is the author of Lost in Math: How Beauty Leads Physics Astray, which explores the concept of elegance in fundamental physics and cosmology.
Education
Hossenfelder completed her undergraduate degree in 1997 at Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität in Frankfurt am Main.[3] She remained there for a Master's degree, and she wrote a thesis under the supervision of Walter Greiner titled "Particle Production in Time Dependent Gravitational Fields", which she completed in 2000.[4] Hossenfelder received her doctorate from the same institution in 2003, for the thesis "Black Holes in Large Extra Dimensions" under the supervision of Horst Stöcker.[5][6]
Research
Hossenfelder remained in Germany until 2004 as a postdoctoral researcher at the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research in Darmstadt, Germany.[3] She moved to North America and completed research fellowships at the University of Arizona, Tucson, University of California, Santa Barbara and Perimeter Institute, Canada.[7][8][9] She joined Nordita Institute for Theoretical Physics, Sweden, in 2009 as an Assistant Professor.[10][11] In 2018 she was a Research Fellow at the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies.[12]
Hossenfelder's research interest is in the phenomenology of quantum gravity.[10] She focuses on the role of Lorentz invariance and locality, which would be altered in the discovery of quantum gravity.[10] Hossenfelder is trying to find experimental evidence of quantum gravity.[13][14][15][16] Since 2007 she has been involved with the annual conference series "Experimental Search for Quantum Gravity".[17] Hossenfelder has created a number of YouTube videos exploring the topic.[18][19][20] She has been employed by the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies since 2015, where she leads the Analog Systems for Gravity Duals group.[21] Another area of her research are foundations of quantum mechanics, where she has argued against free will and in favor of superdeterminism.[22][23]
Hossenfelder has also been researching since at least 2008 on how technology is changing researchers' ability to publicize, discuss, or publish their research, when she co-organized the Science in the 21st Century workshop.[24]
Public engagement
Hossenfelder is a freelance popular science writer who has kept a blog since 2006.[25] She contributes to the Forbes column "Starts with a Bang"[26] as well as Quanta Magazine,[27] New Scientist,[28] Nature,[29] Scientific American,[30] Nautilus[31] and Physics Today.[citation needed] In 2016, Hossenfelder offered to act as a physics consultant on her blog—US$50 for twenty minutes of discussion—and had to recruit five extra physicists to deal with the demand.[32][33] In 2017 she created cards featuring pioneering quantum physicists.[34] Live Science and The Guardian quoted Hossenfelder as an authority when trying to evaluate the importance of Stephen Hawking's last scientific publication.[35][36]
Basic Books are the publishers of Hossenfelder's first book, Lost in Math: How Beauty Leads Physics Astray, released in June 2018.[37][38][39] A review in Nature described it as "provocative",[40] and Frank Wilczek recommended it as an "intensely personal and intellectually hard-edged" book, even though he disagreed with it "on many points".[41] Peter Woit summarized the book's theme as follows:
- At various points Hossenfelder makes it clear that her worry is that physicists are getting stuck due to outdated notions of "beauty", while at the same time she still believes that successful new ideas will come with their own new form of "beauty".[42]
Hossenfelder also is invited for talks, about "What is wrong with physics" for example.[43]
Her 2018 book, Lost in Math, was also published in German with the title, Das hässliche Universum (The Ugly Universe). Hossenfelder posits that the universe (and its particle model) is messy, and that it cannot be described by a mathematical (beautiful) Great Unifying Theory.[citation needed]
Bibliography
- Sabine Hossenfelder, Lost in Math: How Beauty Leads Physics Astray, Basic Books, June 2018.
- Sabine Hossenfelder and Stacy S. McGaugh, "Is Dark Matter Real? Astrophysicists have piled up observations that are difficult to explain with dark matter. It is time to consider that there may be more to gravity than Einstein taught us", Scientific American, vol. 319, no. 2 (August 2018), pp. 36–43.
References
- ^ Hossenfelder, Sabine (12 June 2018). Lost in Math: How Beauty Leads Physics Astray. Basic Books. ISBN 9780465094264. Retrieved 9 November 2019.
- ^ "Die Grundlagenphysik hat sich vergaloppiert, sagt die Physikerin Sabine Hossenfelder im Interview" – Kultur
- ^ a b "Bio". sabinehossenfelder.com. Archived from the original on 2019-01-28. Retrieved 2019-01-17.
- ^ Hossenfelder, Sabine; Schwarz, Dominik J.; Greiner, Walter (2003). "Particle production in time-dependent gravitational fields: the expanding mass shell". Classical and Quantum Gravity. 20 (11): 2337–2354. arXiv:gr-qc/0210110. Bibcode:2003CQGra..20.2337H. doi:10.1088/0264-9381/20/11/325. ISSN 0264-9381. S2CID 18839899.
- ^ Hossenfelder, Sabine; Bleicher, Marcus; Hofmann, Stefan; Stöcker, Horst; Kotwal, Ashutosh V. (2003). "Black hole relics in large extra dimensions". Physics Letters B. 566 (3–4): 233–239. arXiv:hep-ph/0302247. Bibcode:2003PhLB..566..233H. doi:10.1016/s0370-2693(03)00835-9. S2CID 119330631.
- ^ DeBakcsy, Dale (September 26, 2018). "Sabine Hossenfelder and the Trials of 21st Century Physics". Women You Should Know. Archived from the original on 9 November 2018. Retrieved 9 November 2018.
- ^ "The Multiverse at Perimeter | Not Even Wrong". www.math.columbia.edu. Archived from the original on 2017-12-29. Retrieved 2018-01-27.
- ^ Horgan, John. "Physicist Sabine Hossenfelder Fears Theorists, Lacking Data, May Succumb to "Wishful Thinking"". Scientific American Blog Network. Archived from the original on 2018-01-28. Retrieved 2018-01-27.
- ^ Hossenfelder, S. (2008). "Bimetric theory with exchange symmetry". Physical Review D. 78 (4): 044015. arXiv:0807.2838. Bibcode:2008PhRvD..78d4015H. doi:10.1103/physrevd.78.044015. S2CID 119152509.
- ^ a b c Mühlen, Hans. "Sabine Hossenfelder - NORDITA". www.nordita.org. Archived from the original on 2018-01-28. Retrieved 2018-01-27.
- ^ Are we there yet? : the search for a theory of everything. Emam, Moataz H. [Saif Zone, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates]: Bentham Science Publishers. 2011. ISBN 9781608052141. OCLC 759158465.CS1 maint: others (link)
- ^ "Sabine Hossenfelder | Edge.org". www.edge.org. Archived from the original on 2018-01-28. Retrieved 2018-01-27.
- ^ "Talks". sabinehossenfelder.com. Archived from the original on 2019-01-28. Retrieved 2019-01-17.
- ^ Hossenfelder, Sabine (2015-10-10). "News from Quantum Gravity Phenomenology".
- ^ Hossenfelder, Sabine (2010-10-17). "Experimental Search for Quantum Gravity". In V. R. Frignanni (ed.). Classical and Quantum Gravity: Theory, Analysis and Applications. 5. Nova Publishers. arXiv:1010.3420. Bibcode:2010arXiv1010.3420H.
- ^ Hossenfelder, Sabine; Marletto, Chiara; Vedral, Vlatko (2017-09-06). "Quantum gravity: Quantum effects in the gravitational field". Nature. 549 (7670): 31. Bibcode:2017Natur.549...31H. doi:10.1038/549031a. PMID 28880282.
- ^ "Experimental Search for Quantum Gravity (19-30 September 2016)". Indico - FIAS Events. Archived from the original on 5 November 2016. Retrieved 2018-01-27.
- ^ Sabine Hossenfelder (2017-10-11), What could we learn from quantum gravity?, archived from the original on 2018-02-11, retrieved 2018-01-27
- ^ Selen Atalay (2016-08-27), Sabine Hossenfelder talks about Quantum Gravity Phenomonology in 3 mins, retrieved 2018-01-27
- ^ Sabine Hossenfelder (2012-07-30), My research area: The Phenomenology of Quantum Gravity, archived from the original on 2018-02-11, retrieved 2018-01-27
- ^ "Analog Systems for Gravity Duals / FIAS". fias.institute. Archived from the original on 2018-07-19. Retrieved 2018-07-19.
- ^ Hossenfelder, Sabine; Palmer, Tim (6 May 2020). "Rethinking Superdeterminism". Frontiers in Physics. doi:10.3389/fphy.2020.00139.
- ^ "The Forgotten Solution: Superdeterminism". backreaction.blogspot.com. 28 July 2019. Retrieved 17 December 2020.
- ^ "Science in the 21st Century | Perimeter Institute". www.perimeterinstitute.ca. Archived from the original on 2019-06-16. Retrieved 2019-03-03.
- ^ "About". backreaction.blogspot.ch. Archived from the original on 2018-01-28. Retrieved 2018-01-27.
- ^ Hossenfelder, Sabine. "Why Trust A Theory? Physicists And Philosophers Debate The Scientific Method". Starts With A Bang. Forbes. Archived from the original on 2018-01-28. Retrieved 2018-01-27.
- ^ "Sabine Hossenfelder | Quanta Magazine". www.quantamagazine.org. Archived from the original on 2018-01-15. Retrieved 2018-01-27.
- ^ "Strangely familiar: Is dark matter normal stuff in disguise?". New Scientist. Archived from the original on 2018-01-28. Retrieved 2018-01-27.
- ^ Hossenfelder, Sabine (2017-04-05). "Science needs reason to be trusted". Nature Physics. 13 (4): 316–317. Bibcode:2017NatPh..13..316H. doi:10.1038/nphys4079.
- ^ Hossenfelder, Sabine (2015). "Head Trip". Scientific American. 313 (3): 46–49. Bibcode:2015SciAm.313c..46H. doi:10.1038/scientificamerican0915-46. PMID 26455101.
- ^ Hossenfelder, Sabine (2017-02-02). "What Quantum Gravity Needs Is More Experiments". Nautilus. Archived from the original on 2018-01-28. Retrieved 2018-01-27.
- ^ "Q&A with Sabine Hossenfelder: Consultant for Armchair Physicists". www.aps.org. Archived from the original on 2018-01-28. Retrieved 2018-01-27.
- ^ "What I learned as a hired consultant to autodidact physicists – Sabine Hossenfelder | Aeon Ideas". Aeon. Archived from the original on 2018-01-28. Retrieved 2018-01-27.
- ^ "The Quantum Quartet". backreaction.blogspot.com. Archived from the original on 2019-06-16. Retrieved 2019-09-22.
- ^ "Stephen Hawking's Last Paper (Probably) Doesn't Prove We Live in a Multiverse". Live Science. Archived from the original on 2018-03-30. Retrieved 2018-03-29.
- ^ Sample, Ian (2018-03-14). "A life in science: Stephen Hawking". the Guardian. Archived from the original on 2018-03-29. Retrieved 2018-03-29.
- ^ Hossenfelder, Sabine (2018). Lost in Math: How Beauty Leads Physics Astray. Basic Books. ISBN 9780465094264.
- ^ "Review of Lost in Math". Kirkus Reviews. April 2018. Archived from the original on 2018-06-08. Retrieved 2018-06-05.
- ^ "Review of Lost in Math". Publishers Weekly. 30 April 2018. Archived from the original on 12 June 2018. Retrieved 8 June 2018.
- ^ "Interactions: Conversation with Sabine Hossenfelder : On your wavelength". blogs.nature.com. Archived from the original on 2018-06-27. Retrieved 2018-07-19.
- ^ Wilczek, Frank (2018-09-01). "Has elegance betrayed physics?". Physics Today. 71 (9): 57. doi:10.1063/PT.3.4022.
- ^ Woit, Peter (2018-06-11). "Lost in Math". MAA Reviews. Mathematical Association of America. Archived from the original on 2019-06-16. Retrieved 2019-12-22.
- ^ Was läuft falsch in der gegenwärtigen Physik? Archived 2019-12-21 at the Wayback Machine, University of Stuttgart, 2019-05-14.
External links
Quotations related to Sabine Hossenfelder at Wikiquote
- Sabine Hossenfelder's personal website
- Sabine Hossenfelder's channel on YouTube