This year’s Hamburg Prize for Theoretical Physics will be presented to Austrian Matthias Troyer, a professor at ETH Zurich and quantum computing researcher at software company Microsoft. He is receiving the prize for his contributions to the development of quantum Monte Carlo algorithms.

Using random numbers, these algorithms can predict how tiny particles will interact within quantum mechanical many-body systems such as atoms and molecules. As a result, Troyer is playing a key role in basic research and the ongoing development of quantum computers and superconductive materials. He is one of just a handful of leading international researchers in this field. The Joachim Herz Stiftung awards the prize in conjunction with the Wolfgang Pauli Centre (WPC) at the University of Hamburg, DESY, and the Cluster of Excellence “CUI: Advanced Imaging of Matter” at the University of Hamburg.

This year’s Hamburg Prize for Theoretical Physics will be awarded to the Japanese scientist Hirosi Ooguri. Ooguri, born in 1962, is a professor at California Institute of Technology (Caltech) in Pasadena (USA). He is one of the world’s leading experts on so-called topological string theory, which addresses mathematical aspects of superstring theory – an important path towards an all-encompassing theory on the nature of our universe. Ooguri will be presented with the award on November 7, 2018 at the Hamburg Planetarium.

Ooguri´s research deals with mathematical superstring theory. Ooguri has succeeded in enabling many physical phenomena to be computed with the aid of string theory. He was able to overcome many of the major mathematical difficulties of string theory. Moreover, Ooguri’s research on the quantum mechanics of black holes continues the research of physicist Stephen Hawking, who died earlier this year.

Ooguri arrived at Caltech in 2000 as a professor for theoretical physics. He is Fred Kavli Professor and Director of the Walter Burke Institute for Theoretical Physics. Moreover, he is a principal investigator of the Kavli Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe at the University of Tokyo, and has recently been appointed President of the Aspen Center for Physics in Colorado, USA.

Ooguri has received numerous awards. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, to name but one, and has also received the Leonard Eisenbud Prize for Mathematics and Physics from the American Mathematical Society.

This year's Hamburg Prize for Theoretical Physics, jointly awarded by the Joachim Herz Stiftung and The Hamburg Centre for Ultrafast Imaging (CUI), will be given to Andrew Millis, Professor at Columbia University in New York and Associate Director for Physical Sciences at the Simons Foundation.

The prize recognizes, the U.S. physicist for his outstanding research in condensed matter physics, a field focusing on atomic and molecular interactions in solids and liquids. His work enables calculations that predict electronic properties of materials, including electrical conductivity and the tendency to magnetism. He has made landmark discoveries in properties of superconducting materials (which can conduct electric current without losses).

While most superconductors must be cooled to extremely low temperatures to reach lossless conductivity - a time-consuming and expensive process - a few are superconducting at much higher temperatures. Millis' research has enhanced our understanding of these special materials, and his recent work may provide a path to pushing the temperature threshold for superconductivity even higher, perhaps all the way to room temperature.

Millis studied physics at Harvard University and received a PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1986. He then worked as a scientist at Bell Laboratories in New Jersey. In 1996 Millis was appointed professor at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore and three years later moved to Rutgers University in New Jersey. In 2001 he joined the physics department at Columbia University, where he served as Department Chair from 2006 - 2009. Since 2011 he has been Associate Director for Physical Sciences at the Simons Foundation, a large U.S. foundation whose mission is to advance mathematics and basic research. Starting Sept 1, 2017 he will also be co-Director of the Center for Computational Quantum Physics at the Simons Foundation's new Flatiron Institute.

Prof. Katsnelson is working on the quantum mechanical many-body theory, the theory of strongly correlated systems, and the quantum theory of magnetism as well as of graphene. Katsnelson is a researcher with an extraordinary broad range of interests. His work on graphene has greatly profited from his versatile expertise and methodology. Graphene has many remarkable characteristics and can be applied to very different fields of science.

Mikhail Katsnelson published his first scientific papers at the age of 17 and started his academic career in the former Soviet Union. After passing the Master of Science examination in Theoretical Physics at the Department of Physics at Ural State University, Sverdlovsk, he received his PhD in Solid State Physics at the Institute of Metal Physics (Sverdlovsk) in 1980 and his DSc in 1985. Seven years later he was appointed to a professorship for Solid State Physics and for Mathematical Physics at Ural State University. In 2004, after spending two years in Sweden as visiting professor at Uppsala University, Radboud University in Nijmegen, Netherlands, appointed him to a professorship. He is head of the group “Theory of Condensed Matter”.

The recipient of the 2015 “Hamburg Prize for Theoretical Physics” is Prof. Dr. Ignacio Cirac, Director at the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics in Garching and head of the Theory Division. 

Ignacio Cirac studied theoretical physics at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid where he received his PhD in 1991. He began his career in physics as a “Professor Titular” at the Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha where he stayed until 1996. In 1996 he became a Professor at the department of Theoretical Physics at the University of Innsbruck. Since 2001 he has been Director at the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics in Garching and head of the Theory Division.

Prof. Cirac develops methods to describe and control atoms, molecules and photons on the basis of quantum mechanics. His quantum physics models are particularly pioneering for the control and storage of information, which is, for instance, important for the development of quantum computers. Cirac’s methods also make major contributions to other fields like solid state physics, superconductivity and recently even the simulation of models of particle physics.

Honors and Awards (selection)

Felix Kuschenitz Preis, Austrian Academy of Sciences, 2001,

Quantum Electronics Prize, European Science Foundation, 2005,

Royal Spanish Prince of Asturias Prize, 2006,

International Quantum Communication Award, 2006, together with Professor Peter Zoller,

Frontiers of Knowledge Award in Basic Sciences, BBVA Foundation, 2009,

Benjamin Franklin Medal, Franklin Institute in Philadelphia, 2009, together with Professor Peter Zoller,

Israeli Wolf Prize and Niels Bohr Medal, 2013,

Honorary Doctor from the University of Zaragoza, 2014,

Honorary Doctor from the University of Valencia as well as the Universitat Politècnica de València, 2015.

The recipient of the 2014 Hamburg Prize for Theoretical Physics is Prof. Antoine Georges, distinguished Professor at the Collège de France and the École Polytechnique in Paris, as well as the University of Geneva.  He receives the prize due to his contributions to condensed matter physics, in particular for the development of novel methods to describe strongly correlated systems. 

In 1988 Prof. Georges received his PhD at the École Normale Supérieure. Due to an offer of the Princeton University, Antoine Georges has been working in the USA as a Postdoc from 1989 to 1991. With returning to France in 1991, he deepened his research regarding the condensed matter physics and later on in 2003 directed a research team at the École Polytechnique. Since 2009 he is a Professor of Condensed Matter Physics at the Collège de France. He is also working as a part-time professor at the University of Geneva.

The main focus of Prof. Georges‘ research has been on the physics of materials with strong interactions between electrons, which possess remarkable electronic properties. His contributions deepened our understanding of these materials and our ability to explain, calculate and predict their physical properties.

HONORS AND AWARDS (SELECTION)

Anatole et Suzanne Abragam Prize, Academie des Sciences, 1991

Prix Dargelos, École Polytechnique (AX), 2004

Condensed Matter Europhysics Prize for “the development and application of Dynamical Mean-Field Theory'', European Physical Society and Agilent Technologies, 2006;
together with Gabriel Kotliar, Walter Metzner, Dieter Vollhardt

Médaille d'Argent du CNRS, CNRS, 2007

Laureate of an ERC-Synergy grant, ERC, 2012;
together with Andrea Cavalleri, Dieter Jaksch and Jean-Marc Triscone.

The 2013 Hamburg Prize for Theoretical Physics is awarded to Prof. Chris H. Greene, distinguished Professor of Physics at the Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana, USA. He received the prize for his contributions to a more thorough understanding of Rydberg molecules and eventually their experimental observation.

Chris H. Greene received his PhD at the Chicago University in 1980 and began his career as a Postdoc at the Stanford University until 1981. Afterwards he started working as an assistant professor at the Louisiana State University where he later on became a full Professor of Physics.  From 1989 to 2012 Prof. Greene has been working as a Professor and Fellow at the Joint Institute for Laboratory Astrophysics (JILA), a joint research institute of the University of Colorado Boulder and of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). Since 2012 Chris Greene is working as a distinguished Professor of Physics at the Purdue University in Indiana.

Already in 2000 Prof. Greene developed the theory of an unusual binding mechanism in ultra-cold quantum gases of high density and predicted the existence of the giant Rydberg molecules, which are roughly the same size as a virus but consist of only two atoms. Research on this new class of molecules allows for completely new insights into the dynamics of atomic bonds in chemical compounds.

HONORS AND AWARDS (SELECTION)

Davisson-Germer Prize of the American Physical Society, 2010

University of California at Berkeley, Visiting Miller Professorship, 2007

Alexander von Humboldt Research Award for Senior U.S. Scientists, 2007

The first I. I. Rabi Prize of the American Physical Society, 1991

Presidential Young Investigator Award, 1985

Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Fellowship, 1984