In a brilliant feat of conceptual sleight of hand, he forged a connection between the esoteric formulas of string theory and the rest of mainstream physics.
The Man Who Does Tricks
By J. Madeleine Nash
Juan Maldacena with a set of mathematical equations is like a magician with a wand. He can take rows of arcane symbols that describe the gravitational weirdness of a black hole and, with a flourish, pull from them equations that look suspiciously like those that govern the will-o'-the-wisp interactions of subatomic particles. What's more, the associate professor of physics at Harvard University can perform the same trick in reverse, effectively concealing the rabbit back inside the hat.
In this playful way, the 31-year-old native of Buenos Aires has been able to suggest a way to knit together two theories previously thought to be incompatible: quantum mechanics, which deals with the universe at its smallest scales; and Einstein's general theory of relativity, which deals with the very largest. Even as an undergraduate at Argentina's Instituto Balseiro, Maldacena had been intrigued by the idea that a bridge spanning the two might be constructed using string theory-so called because it assumes the fundamental constituents of matter are not pointlike particles but tiny, vibrating loops of string.
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Name: Juan Maldacena Age: 31 Why critics are taking note: Maldacena has forged a connection between string theory and the rest of physics |
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Juan Maldacena
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