News: Faculty

Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics (“Perimeter”) today announced the appointment of Marcela Carena as its new Executive Director. Carena succeeds Robert Myers, who recently completed his five-year term.

Study by Asst. Prof. Da Yang provides powerful framework that sheds light on key processes driving extreme weather patterns.

On October 28, a Hungarian diplomat delivered a curious mathematical object to its new permanent home at the University of Chicago: a convex three-dimensional metal sculpture called a Gömböc.

The University of Chicago launched the Institute for Climate and Sustainable Growth, an ambitious effort combining frontier research in economics and climate policy, and key energy and climate technologies, with a pioneering approach to education. The result is a first-of-its-kind institute that will produce new and deeper understandings of the climate challenge as well as practical, effective solutions.

UChicago astronomers have tested a simpler, and more accurate way to determine whether or not exoplanets have atmospheres, a leap in learning more about the potential habitability of far-away planets. 

A study from the UChicago showed a new way to target previously “undruggable” proteins involved in cancer by building a new kind of synthetic molecule. These results are encouraging and will further exploration into new methods to fight diseases.  

On Oct. 30, UChicago will welcome world-leading scholars and leaders from industry and government to discuss climate and energy policy and research—culminating with the official launch of a groundbreaking new climate and energy institute at UChicago.  

In light of the devastating effects of hurricane Milton, scientists are discussing the possibilities and limitations of scientific responses to climate change. UChicago Prof. David Keith, faculty director of the Climate Systems Engineering Initiative, comments on the potential benefits of geoengineering.

The 2024 Nobel Prize in physics was awarded to scientists John Hopfield and Geoffrey Hinton for their discoveries and contributions to the field of machine learning. In this article, UChicago Prof. Rebecca Willett comments on the importance of these scientists' work for the development of AI and neural networks.

The James Webb Space Telescope has unveiled a new class of cosmic objects. They are colloquially called little red dots, and they indicate something in the early universe that had never been seen. UChicago Prof. Andrey Kravtsov speaks on the significance of this discovery. 

Chemistry Prof. Gregory Voth was honored by the American Chemical Society with a symposium. Over four days, more than 60 speakers from around the country, made up of researchers, friends, and colleagues, came together to present on a wide range of topics influenced by Prof. Voth’s work. 

The UChicago team led by Dr. Kyle Chard, Dr. Ian Foster, and Dr. Ben Blaiszik plans to create Globus Search, an expansion to Globus that will allow researchers to search, index, access, and manage data across multiple locations, from laptops to supercomputers.

Astronomy and Astrophysics Asst. Prof. Austin Joyce has been selected for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Early Career Research Program. Prof. Joyce will use this opportunity to apply cosmological quantum field theory to understand how the universe evolved and acquired its structure.

In new research paper, co-authored by UChicago Asst. Prof. Andrew Higginbotham, scientists demonstrate that Josephson junctions dissipate energy as photons, directly measuring them using a sensitive bolometer.

In this interview, UChicago Prof. Danny Calegari discusses the role of failure in mathematics and how it propelled his latest essay published in a recent issue of the Notices of the American Mathematical Society.