Citizenship United States Fields Theoretical physics Role Physicist | Name John Preskill Nationality American | |
 | ||
Doctoral students Peter GalisonDaniel GottesmanAnton KapustinSandip Trivedi Residence Pasadena, California, United States Similar People Daniel Gottesman, Sandip Trivedi, Steven Weinberg, Peter Galison, Sheldon Lee Glashow | ||
John preskill 2015 breakthrough prize in fundamental physics symposium
John Phillip Preskill (born January 19, 1953) is an American theoretical physicist and the Richard P. Feynman Professor of Theoretical Physics at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).
Contents
- John preskill 2015 breakthrough prize in fundamental physics symposium
- Quantum computing the entanglement john preskill
- Biography
- References
Quantum computing the entanglement john preskill
Biography
Preskill was born in Highland Park, Illinois. After earning a B.A. in physics at Princeton University, summa cum laude, in 1975, he received his Ph.D. in the same subject from Harvard University in 1980. His graduate adviser at Harvard was Steven Weinberg.
While still a graduate student, Preskill made a name for himself by publishing a paper on the cosmological production of superheavy magnetic monopoles in Grand Unified Theories. Since we do not observe any magnetic monopoles, this work pointed out serious flaws in the then current cosmological models, a problem which was later addressed by Alan Guth and others by proposing the idea of cosmic inflation.
After three years as a junior fellow of the Harvard Society of Fellows, Preskill became Associate Professor of Theoretical Physics at Caltech in 1983, rising to full professorship in 1990. Since 2000 he has been the Director of the Institute for Quantum Information at Caltech. In recent years most of his work has been in mathematical issues related to quantum computation and quantum information theory.
Preskill has achieved some notoriety in the popular press as party to a number of bets involving fellow theoretical physicists Stephen Hawking and Kip Thorne. Hawking conceded the Thorne–Hawking–Preskill bet in 2004 and gave Preskill a copy of Total Baseball, The Ultimate Baseball Encyclopedia.
