Neil Geoffrey Turok (born 16 November 1958) is a South African

physicist A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe. Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate caus ...

. He holds the Higgs Chair of Theoretical Physics at the

University of Edinburgh The University of Edinburgh ( sco, University o Edinburgh, gd, Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in post-nominals) is a public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Granted a royal charter by King James VI in 15 ...

since 2020, and has been director emeritus of the

Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics (PI, Perimeter, PITP) is an independent research centre in foundational theoretical physics located in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. It was founded in 1999. The institute's founding and major benefactor i ...

since 2019. He specializes in mathematical physics and early-universe physics, including the

cosmological constant In cosmology, the cosmological constant (usually denoted by the Greek capital letter lambda: ), alternatively called Einstein's cosmological constant, is the constant coefficient of a term that Albert Einstein temporarily added to his field equ ...

and a

cyclic model A cyclic model (or oscillating model) is any of several cosmological models in which the universe follows infinite, or indefinite, self-sustaining cycles. For example, the oscillating universe theory briefly considered by Albert Einstein in 1930 t ...

for the universe.

Early life and career

Turok was born on 16 November 1958 in

Johannesburg Johannesburg ( , , ; Zulu and xh, eGoli ), colloquially known as Jozi, Joburg, or "The City of Gold", is the largest city in South Africa, classified as a megacity, and is one of the 100 largest urban areas in the world. According to Demo ...

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

, to Mary (Butcher) and Byelorussian-born

Ben Turok Ben Turok (26 June 1927 – 9 December 2019) was an anti-apartheid activist, Economics Professor, convicted criminal and a South African member of parliament as a member of the African National Congress. Biography Turok was born to poor working ...

, who were activists in the

anti-apartheid movement The Anti-Apartheid Movement (AAM), was a British organisation that was at the centre of the international movement opposing the South African apartheid system and supporting South Africa's non-White population who were persecuted by the policie ...

and the

African National Congress The African National Congress (ANC) is a Social democracy, social-democratic political party in Republic of South Africa, South Africa. A liberation movement known for its opposition to apartheid, it has governed the country since 1994, when ...

. After graduating from

Churchill College Churchill College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge, England. It has a primary focus on science, engineering and technology, but still retains a strong interest in the arts and humanities. In 1958, a trust was establish ...

, Cambridge, Turok gained his doctorate from

Imperial College Imperial College London (legally Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine) is a public research university in London, United Kingdom. Its history began with Prince Albert, consort of Queen Victoria, who developed his vision for a cu ...

, London, under the supervision of

David Olive David Ian Olive ( ; 16 April 1937 – 7 November 2012) was a British theoretical physicist. Olive made fundamental contributions to string theory and duality theory, he is particularly known for his work on the GSO projection and Montonen–Ol ...

, one of the inventors of

superstring theory Superstring theory is an attempt to explain all of the particles and fundamental forces of nature in one theory by modeling them as vibrations of tiny supersymmetric strings. 'Superstring theory' is a shorthand for supersymmetric string theor ...

. After a postdoctoral post at Santa Barbara, he was an associate scientist at

Fermilab Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab), located just outside Batavia, Illinois, near Chicago, is a United States Department of Energy national laboratory specializing in high-energy particle physics. Since 2007, Fermilab has been operat ...

, Illinois. In 1992 he was awarded the Maxwell medal of the

Institute of Physics The Institute of Physics (IOP) is a UK-based learned society and professional body that works to advance physics education, research and application. It was founded in 1874 and has a worldwide membership of over 20,000. The IOP is the Physica ...

for his contributions to theoretical physics. In 1994 he was appointed Professor of Physics at

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...

, then held the Chair of Mathematical Physics at the University of Cambridge starting in 1997. He was appointed Director of the

Perimeter Institute Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics (PI, Perimeter, PITP) is an independent research centre in foundational theoretical physics located in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. It was founded in 1999. The institute's founding and major benefactor i ...

in 2008. In 2020, Turok was appointed as the Inaugural Higgs Chair of Theoretical Physics at the

Research and other contributions

Turok has worked in a number of areas of mathematical physics and early universe physics, focusing on observational tests of fundamental physics in

cosmology Cosmology () is a branch of physics and metaphysics dealing with the nature of the universe. The term ''cosmology'' was first used in English in 1656 in Thomas Blount (lexicographer), Thomas Blount's ''Glossographia'', and in 1731 taken up in ...

. In the early 1990s, his group showed how the polarisation and temperature anisotropies of the

cosmic background radiation Cosmic background radiation is electromagnetic radiation from the Big Bang. The origin of this radiation depends on the region of the spectrum that is observed. One component is the cosmic microwave background. This component is redshifted pho ...

would be correlated, a prediction which has been confirmed in detail by recent precision measurements by the

WMAP The Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP), originally known as the Microwave Anisotropy Probe (MAP and Explorer 80), was a NASA spacecraft operating from 2001 to 2010 which measured temperature differences across the sky in the cosmic mic ...

spacecraft. They also developed a key test for the presence of a

, also recently confirmed. Turok and collaborators developed the theory of open inflation. With Stephen Hawking, he later developed the so-called Hawking-Turok

instanton An instanton (or pseudoparticle) is a notion appearing in theoretical and mathematical physics. An instanton is a classical solution to equations of motion with a finite, non-zero action, either in quantum mechanics or in quantum field theory. Mo ...

solutions which, according to the no-boundary proposal of Hawking and

James Hartle James Burkett Hartle (August 20, 1939) is an American physicist. He has been a professor of physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara since 1966, and he is currently a member of the external faculty of the Santa Fe Institute. Hartle ...

, can describe the birth of an

inflationary universe In physical cosmology, cosmic inflation, cosmological inflation, or just inflation, is a theory of exponential expansion of space in the early universe. The inflationary epoch lasted from seconds after the conjectured Big Bang singularit ...

. Together with Justin Khoury, Burt Ovrut and

Paul Steinhardt Paul Joseph Steinhardt (born December 25, 1952) is an American theoretical physicist whose principal research is in cosmology and condensed matter physics. He is currently the Albert Einstein Professor in Science at Princeton University, where he ...

, Turok introduced the notion of the

Ekpyrotic Universe The ekpyrotic universe () is a physical cosmology, cosmological model of the early universe that explains the origin of the large-scale structure of the cosmos. The model has also been incorporated in the cyclic universe theory (or ekpyrotic cycl ...

, "... a cosmological model in which the hot big bang universe is produced by the collision of a

brane In string theory and related theories such as supergravity theories, a brane is a physical object that generalizes the notion of a point particle to higher dimensions. Branes are dynamical objects which can propagate through spacetime accordin ...

in the bulk space with a bounding orbifold plane, beginning from an otherwise cold, vacuous, static universe". Most recently, with

at Princeton, Turok has been developing a

for the universe, in which the big bang is explained as a collision between two "brane-worlds" in M theory. The predictions of this model are in agreement with current cosmological data, but there are interesting differences with the predictions of cosmological inflation which will be probed by future experiments (probably by the

Planck Max Karl Ernst Ludwig Planck (, ; 23 April 1858 – 4 October 1947) was a German theoretical physicist whose discovery of energy quanta won him the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1918. Planck made many substantial contributions to theoretical p ...

space observatory). In 2006, Steinhardt and Turok showed how the cyclic model could naturally incorporate a mechanism for relaxing the

to very small values, consistent with current observations. In 2007, Steinhardt and Turok co-authored the popular science book ''Endless Universe''. In 2012, Turok's

Massey Lectures The Massey Lectures is an annual five-part series of lectures given in Canada by distinguished writers, thinkers and scholars who explore important ideas and issues of contemporary interest. Created in 1961 in honour of Vincent Massey, the former ...

were published as ''The Universe Within: from Quantum to Cosmos''. In 2003, Turok founded the

African Institute for Mathematical Sciences The African Institute for Mathematical Sciences (AIMS) is a tertiary education and research institute in Muizenberg, South Africa, established in September 2003, and an associated network of linked institutes in Senegal, Ghana, Cameroon, Tanzan ...

Muizenberg Muizenberg ( , Dutch for "mice mountain") is a beach-side town in the Western Cape, South Africa. It is situated where the shore of the Cape Peninsula curves round to the east on the False Bay coast. It is considered to be the main surfing spot i ...

, a postgraduate educational centre supporting the development of mathematics and science across the African continent.

Awards and honours

He was awarded the 2008

TED TED may refer to: Economics and finance * TED spread between U.S. Treasuries and Eurodollar Education * ''Türk Eğitim Derneği'', the Turkish Education Association ** TED Ankara College Foundation Schools, Turkey ** Transvaal Education Depa ...

Prize for his work in mathematical physics and in establishing the

. He also received a "Most Innovative People Award," for Social Innovation, at the World Summit on Innovation and Entrepreneurship (WSIE) in 2008. On 9 May 2008,

Mike Lazaridis Mihal "Mike" Lazaridis (born March 14, 1961) is a Canadian businessman, investor in quantum computing technologies, and founder of BlackBerry, which created and manufactured the BlackBerry wireless handheld device. With an estimated net worth of ...

announced that Turok would become the new Executive Director of the

starting on 1 October 2008. In 2010 Turok received a prize from the

World Innovation Summit for Education The World Innovation Summit for Education (WISE) is an international initiative aimed at transforming education through innovation. WISE was established by Qatar Foundation in 2009 under the patronage of its chairperson, Sheikha Mozah bint Nass ...

in Qatar and an award from the

South African Mathematical Society The South African Mathematical Society (SAMS) is a professional mathematical society of South Africa. The Society was established in 1957. The SAMS publishes a research journal ''Quaestiones Mathematicae'', as well the ''Notices of the South Africa ...

. In 2011 Turok received an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Ottawa. On 3 November 2011, Turok was selected to deliver the

for the 2012 season. This involves five separate lectures to be delivered in various locations across Canada in October 2012, aired on CBC's ''

Ideas In common usage and in philosophy, ideas are the results of thought. Also in philosophy, ideas can also be mental representational images of some object. Many philosophers have considered ideas to be a fundamental ontological category of being. ...

'' shortly thereafter. Turok received an honorary doctorate from

Heriot-Watt University Heriot-Watt University ( gd, Oilthigh Heriot-Watt) is a public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. It was established in 1821 as the School of Arts of Edinburgh, the world's first mechanics' institute, and subsequently granted univ ...

in 2012. In 2012 Turok was the recipient of the

Lane Anderson Award The Lane Anderson Award is an annual award presented to Canadian non-fiction science in two categories; adult and young readers. It is funded by the Fitzhenry Family Foundation, and headed by Sharon Fitzhenry and Hollister Doll. Winners receive a ...

for his book ''The Universe Within: From Quantum to Cosmos.'' Turok was awarded the honorary degrees of Doctor of Science, ''honoris causa'' from UCLouvain (4 February 2019), Saint Mary's University (16 May 2014), the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University (9 April 2014) and

Stellenbosch University Stellenbosch University ( af, Universiteit Stellenbosch) is a public research university situated in Stellenbosch, a town in the Western Cape province of South Africa. Stellenbosch is the oldest university in South Africa and the oldest extant ...

(26 March 2015). Turok was awarded the 2016 John Torrence Tate Award at the 2016 SPS Quadrennial Congress in San Francisco.

References

External links

Neil Turok's home page

African Institute for Mathematical Sciences

Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics
* http://news.nmmu.ac.za/News/Acclaimed-physicist-to-receive-honorary-doctorate
Interviewed by Tina Kosir on 19 February 2008 (video)

Interviewed by Alan Macfarlane 27 April 2017 (video)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Turok, Neil 1958 births Living people Alumni of Churchill College, Cambridge Alumni of Imperial College London Cambridge mathematicians South African cosmologists Fellows of Downing College, Cambridge Maxwell Medal and Prize recipients Officers of the Order of Canada People educated at William Ellis School People from Waterloo, Ontario 20th-century South African physicists Theoretical physicists String theorists