Anton Nikolayevich Kapustin (born November 10, 1971, Moscow) is a Russian-American
theoretical physicist
Theoretical physics is a branch of physics that employs mathematical models and abstractions of physical objects and systems to rationalize, explain and predict natural phenomena. This is in contrast to experimental physics, which uses experime ...
and the
Earle C. Anthony Professor of Theoretical Physics at the
California Institute of Technology
The California Institute of Technology (branded as Caltech or CIT)The university itself only spells its short form as "Caltech"; the institution considers other spellings such a"Cal Tech" and "CalTech" incorrect. The institute is also occasional ...
. His interests lie in
quantum field theory and
string theory, and their applications to particle physics and condensed matter theory. He is the son of the pianist-composer
Nikolai Kapustin
Nikolai Girshevich Kapustin (russian: link=no, Никола́й Ги́ршевич Капу́стин ; 22 November 19372 July 2020) was a Soviet composer and pianist of Russian-Jewish descent. He played with early Soviet jazz bands such as the ...
.
Education
Kapustin obtained a
B.S.
A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years.
The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University ...
in physics from
Moscow State University
M. V. Lomonosov Moscow State University (MSU; russian: Московский государственный университет имени М. В. Ломоносова) is a public research university in Moscow, Russia and the most prestigious ...
in 1993. He received a
Ph.D.
A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Because it is ...
in physics from the
California Institute of Technology
The California Institute of Technology (branded as Caltech or CIT)The university itself only spells its short form as "Caltech"; the institution considers other spellings such a"Cal Tech" and "CalTech" incorrect. The institute is also occasional ...
in 1997 with
John Preskill
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
The California Institute of Technology (branded as Caltech ...
as his advisor.
Research
He has made several contributions to dualities and other aspects of quantum field theories, in particular topological field theories and supersymmetric gauge theories. With
Edward Witten
Edward Witten (born August 26, 1951) is an American mathematical and theoretical physicist. He is a Professor Emeritus in the School of Natural Sciences at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. Witten is a researcher in string theory, q ...
he discovered deep connections between the S-duality of supersymmetric gauge theories and the
geometric Langlands correspondence In mathematics, the geometric Langlands correspondence is a reformulation of the Langlands correspondence obtained by replacing the number fields appearing in the original number theoretic version by function fields and applying techniques from a ...
. In recent years, he has focused on mathematical structures in and classification schemes of topological field theories and symmetry-protected topological phases.
References
External links
Homepage
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kapustin, Anton
Living people
California Institute of Technology faculty
Mathematical physicists
American string theorists
1971 births
Soviet physicists
20th-century American physicists
Russian physicists
Simons Investigator