Lisa Randall

Lisa Randall
Lisa Randall at TED
Born	(1962-06-18) June 18, 1962 Queens, New York City, New York, United States
Residence	Massachusetts, United States
Nationality	American
Fields	Physics
Institutions	Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory University of California, Berkeley Princeton University Massachusetts Institute of Technology Harvard University
Alma mater	Stuyvesant High School Harvard University
Doctoral advisor	Howard Georgi
Doctoral students	Csaba Csáki, Eric Sather, Witold Skiba, Shu-fang Su, Emanuel Katz, Matthew Schwartz, Shiyamala Thambyahpillai, Liam Fitzpatrick, David Simmons-Duffin, Brian Shuve
Known for	Randall–Sundrum model Warped Passages
Notable awards	Klopsteg Memorial Award (2006) Lilienfeld Prize (2007) Andrew Gemant Award (2012)

Lisa Randall (born June 18, 1962) is an American theoretical physicist and leading expert on particle physics and cosmology. She is the Frank B. Baird, Jr. Professor of Science on the physics faculty of Harvard University. Her research includes elementary particles and fundamental forces and she has developed and studied a wide variety of models, the most recent involving extra dimensions of space. She has advanced the understanding and testing of the Standard Model, supersymmetry, possible solutions to the hierarchy problem concerning the relative weakness of gravity, cosmology of extra dimensions, baryogenesis, cosmological inflation, and dark matter. Her best-known contribution is the Randall–Sundrum model, first published in 1999 with Raman Sundrum.

Early life and education

Randall was born in Queens in New York City. She is an alumna of Hampshire College Summer Studies in Mathematics and graduated from Stuyvesant High School in 1980, where she was a classmate of fellow physicist and science popularizer Brian Greene. She won first place in the 1980 Westinghouse Science Talent Search at the age of 18. At Harvard, Randall earned both an A.B. in 1983, and a Ph.D. in 1987 in particle physics under the direction of Howard Georgi.

Academia

Randall researches particle physics and cosmology at Harvard, where she is a professor of theoretical physics. Her research concerns elementary particles and fundamental forces, and has involved the study of a wide variety of models, the most recent involving extra dimensions of space. She has also worked on supersymmetry, Standard Model observables, cosmological inflation, baryogenesis, grand unified theories, and general relativity.

Randall's books Warped Passages: Unraveling the Mysteries of the Universe's Hidden Dimensions and Knocking on Heaven’s Door: How Physics and Scientific Thinking Illuminate the Universe and the Modern World have both been on New York Times 100 notable books lists. She has also written the libretto of an opera, Hypermusic Prologue: A Projective Opera in Seven Planes, in collaboration with the composer Hèctor Parra.

After her graduate work at Harvard, Randall held professorships at MIT and Princeton University before returning to Harvard in 2001. Professor Randall was the first tenured woman in the Princeton physics department and the first tenured female theoretical physicist at Harvard. (However, this should not be misconstrued as the first tenured woman in the Harvard physics department. Melissa Franklin was the first to earn that distinction.)

Randall is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2004) and the National Academy of Sciences (2008), and a fellow of the American Physical Society. In autumn 2004, she was the most cited theoretical physicist of the previous five years. Professor Randall was featured in Seed magazine's "2005 Year in Science Icons " and in Newsweek's "Who's Next in 2006" as "one of the most promising theoretical physicists of her generation." In 2007, Randall was named one of Time magazine's 100 Most Influential People (Time 100) under the section for "Scientists & Thinkers". Randall was given this honor for her work regarding the evidence of a higher dimension.

Randall has helped organize numerous conferences and has been on the editorial board of several major theoretical physics journals.

Awards and honors

• Andrew Gemant Award, 2012
• Lilienfeld Prize, 2007
• E.A. Wood Science Writing Award, 2007
• Klopsted Memorial Award from the American Association of Physics Teachers (AAPT), 2006
• Premio Caterina Tomassoni e Felice Pietro Chisesi Award, from the Sapienza University of Rome, 2003
• National Science Foundation Young Investigator Award, 1992
• Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Research Fellowship
• DOE Outstanding Junior Investigator Award.

Personal life

Randall's sister, Dana Randall, is a professor of computer science at Georgia Tech.

External links

• Professor Randall's website at Harvard
• Reprinted Op-Ed from The New York Times of Sunday, September 18, 2005
• Lisa Randall's Edge Bio Page
• On Gravity, Oreos and a Theory of Everything (New York Times, November 1, 2005)
• [1] (archived from Radio Interview) from This Week in Science May 9, 2006 Broadcast
• Profile in Scientific American October 2005
• Lisa Randall is interviewed by Charlie Rose