Allan Adams is an American physicist and oceanographer. His research in physics has focused on

string theory In physics, string theory is a theoretical framework in which the point-like particles of particle physics are replaced by one-dimensional objects called strings. String theory describes how these strings propagate through space and interac ...

, QFT, and

fluid dynamics In physics and engineering, fluid dynamics is a subdiscipline of fluid mechanics that describes the flow of fluids— liquids and gases. It has several subdisciplines, including ''aerodynamics'' (the study of air and other gases in motion) an ...

, while his work in

oceanography Oceanography (), also known as oceanology and ocean science, is the scientific study of the oceans. It is an Earth science, which covers a wide range of topics, including ecosystem dynamics; ocean currents, waves, and geophysical fluid dynamic ...

and ocean engineering have focused on high-precision optical sensing and imaging and on low-cost scalable instrumentation. He currently leads the Future Ocean Lab at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and is a visiting oceanographer at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. Adams earned degrees in physics from Harvard College, UC Berkeley, and

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

before joining the faculty of the MIT Department of Physics in 2008. Adams opened the Future Ocean Lab at MIT in January 2017, and became a Visiting Investigator at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in 2018. In 2021, Adams co-founded Station B, a non-profit ocean engineering field station in Bermuda. Adams is an avid sailplane pilot, cave diver, and father of two boys. He is married to MIT cognitive neuroscientist Rebecca Saxe.

Awards and recognition

Adams was a Junior Fellow in the Harvard Society of Fellows before joining the faculty at MIT. Adams has received numerous awards for his teaching and monitorship, including MIT's School of Science Teaching Prize, the Buechner Teaching and Advising Prizes, and the Baker Memorial Award. His introductory lectures on Quantum Mechanics are freely available via MIT OpenCourseWare and have been viewed more than 10 million times. His talks on gravitational waves at TED 2016 and TED 2014 have been viewed more than 4.7 million times.

Selected publications

* Don't Panic! Closed String Tachyons in ALE Spacetimes. * String universality in ten dimensions. *

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Sigma Models in AdS_4. * Disordered Holographic Systems I & II. * GLSMs for non-Kähler Geometries. * Holographic Vortex Liquids and Superfluid Turbulence. * Holographic Turbulence.

References

Year of birth missing (living people) Living people 21st-century American physicists Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Science faculty Stanford University alumni UC Berkeley College of Letters and Science alumni Harvard College alumni American oceanographers {{US-physicist-stub