Roman Wladimir Jackiw (; born 8 November 1939) is a theoretical

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 ...

and

Dirac Medal The Dirac Medal is the name of four awards in the field of theoretical physics, computational chemistry, and mathematics, awarded by different organizations, named in honour of Professor Paul Dirac, one of the great theoretical physicists of the 20 ...

list. Born in

Lubliniec Lubliniec (german: Lublinitz) is a town in southern Poland with 23,784 inhabitants (2019). It is the capital of Lubliniec County, part of Silesian Voivodeship (since 1999); previously it was in Częstochowa Voivodeship (1975–1998). Geography ...

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...

in 1939 to a

Ukrainian Ukrainian may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Ukraine * Something relating to Ukrainians, an East Slavic people from Eastern Europe * Something relating to demographics of Ukraine in terms of demography and population of Ukraine * So ...

family, the family later moved to

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

and

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

before settling in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

when Jackiw was about 10.

Biography

Jackiw earned his undergraduate degree from

Swarthmore College Swarthmore College ( , ) is a Private college, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania. Founded in 1864, with its first classes held in 1869, Swarthmore is one of the earliest coeduca ...

and his PhD from

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...

in 1966 under

Hans Bethe Hans Albrecht Bethe (; July 2, 1906 – March 6, 2005) was a German-American theoretical physicist who made major contributions to nuclear physics, astrophysics, quantum electrodynamics, and solid-state physics, and who won the 1967 Nobel Prize ...

and Kenneth Wilson. He was a professor at the

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...

Center for Theoretical Physics from 1969 until his retirement. He still retains his affiliation in

emeritus ''Emeritus'' (; female: ''emerita'') is an adjective used to designate a retired chair, professor, pastor, bishop, pope, director, president, prime minister, rabbi, emperor, or other person who has been "permitted to retain as an honorary title ...

status in 2019. Jackiw co-discovered the

chiral anomaly In theoretical physics, a chiral anomaly is the anomalous nonconservation of a chiral current. In everyday terms, it is equivalent to a sealed box that contained equal numbers of left and right-handed bolts, but when opened was found to have more ...

, which is also known as the Adler–Bell–Jackiw anomaly. In 1969, he and

John Stewart Bell John Stewart Bell FRS (28 July 1928 – 1 October 1990) was a physicist from Northern Ireland and the originator of Bell's theorem, an important theorem in quantum physics regarding hidden-variable theories. In 2022, the Nobel Prize in Phy ...

published their explanation, which was later expanded and clarified by

Stephen L. Adler Stephen Louis Adler (born November 30, 1939) is an American physicist specializing in elementary particles and field theory. He is currently Professor Emeritus in the School of Natural Sciences at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, ...

, of the observed decay of a neutral

pion In particle physics, a pion (or a pi meson, denoted with the Greek letter pi: ) is any of three subatomic particles: , , and . Each pion consists of a quark and an antiquark and is therefore a meson. Pions are the lightest mesons and, more gene ...

into two

photon A photon () is an elementary particle that is a quantum of the electromagnetic field, including electromagnetic radiation such as light and radio waves, and the force carrier for the electromagnetic force. Photons are massless, so they always ...

s. This decay is forbidden by a symmetry of

classical electrodynamics Classical electromagnetism or classical electrodynamics is a branch of theoretical physics that studies the interactions between electric charges and currents using an extension of the classical Newtonian model; It is, therefore, a classical fie ...

, but Bell and Jackiw showed that this symmetry cannot be preserved at the quantum level. Their introduction of an "anomalous" term from

quantum field theory In theoretical physics, quantum field theory (QFT) is a theoretical framework that combines classical field theory, special relativity, and quantum mechanics. QFT is used in particle physics to construct physical models of subatomic particles and ...

required that the sum of the charges of the elementary

fermion In particle physics, a fermion is a particle that follows Fermi–Dirac statistics. Generally, it has a half-odd-integer spin: spin , spin , etc. In addition, these particles obey the Pauli exclusion principle. Fermions include all quarks an ...

s had to be zero. This work also gave important support to the color-theory of

quark A quark () is a type of elementary particle and a fundamental constituent of matter. Quarks combine to form composite particles called hadrons, the most stable of which are protons and neutrons, the components of atomic nuclei. All commonly o ...

s. Jackiw is also known for

Jackiw–Teitelboim gravity The ''R'' = ''T'' model, also known as Jackiw–Teitelboim gravity (named after Roman Jackiw and Claudio Teitelboim), is a theory of gravity with dilaton coupling in one spatial and one time dimension. It should not be confused with the CGHS model ...

, a theory of gravity with one dimension each of space and time that includes a

dilaton In particle physics, the hypothetical dilaton particle is a particle of a scalar field \varphi that appears in theories with extra dimensions when the volume of the compactified dimensions varies. It appears as a radion in Kaluza–Klein theor ...

field. Sometimes known as the ''R'' = ''T'' model or as JT gravity, it is used to model some aspects of near-extremal

black hole A black hole is a region of spacetime where gravitation, gravity is so strong that nothing, including light or other Electromagnetic radiation, electromagnetic waves, has enough energy to escape it. The theory of general relativity predicts t ...

s. Jackiw married fellow physicist

So-Young Pi So-Young Pi ( ko, 피서영; born 1946) is a South Korean physicist. So-Young Pi's father was the Korean writer Pi Chun-deuk.Pi Chun-deuk Pi Cheon-deuk (hangul: 피천득, hanja: 皮千得, pen name: Geuma; April 21, 1910 - May 25, 2007) was a Korea Korea ( ko, 한국, or , ) is a peninsular region in East Asia. Since 1945, it has been divided at or near the 38th parallel ...

. One of Jackiw's sons is

Stefan Jackiw Stefan Jackiw (; born 1985) is an American classical violinist. Biography Stefan Jackiw was born in Boston, Massachusetts. His parents are both prominent physics professors, now retired with emeritus status. His mother, So-Young Pi, was the daugh ...

, an American violinist. The other is Nicholas Jackiw, a software designer known for inventing

The Geometer's Sketchpad The Geometer's Sketchpad is a commercial interactive geometry software program for exploring Euclidean geometry, algebra, calculus, and other areas of mathematics. It was created as part of the NSF-funded Visual Geometry Project led by Eugene Klo ...

. His daughter, Simone Ahlborn, is an educator at

Moses Brown School Moses Brown School is an independent Quaker school located in Providence, Rhode Island, offering pre-kindergarten through secondary school classes. It was founded in 1784 by Moses Brown, a Quaker abolitionist, and is one of the oldest prepara ...

in Providence, Rhode Island.

Awards

Heineman Prize Heineman is a surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Benjamin W. Heineman (1914–2012), American railroad executive * Benjamin W. Heineman, Jr. (born 1944), American journalist, lawyer and business executive * Dannie Heineman (1872 ...

, 1995 *On May 26, 2000 Jackiw received an

honorary doctorate An honorary degree is an academic degree for which a university (or other degree-awarding institution) has waived all of the usual requirements. It is also known by the Latin phrases ''honoris causa'' ("for the sake of the honour") or ''ad hon ...

from the Faculty of Science and Technology at

Uppsala University Uppsala University ( sv, Uppsala universitet) is a public university, public research university in Uppsala, Sweden. Founded in 1477, it is the List of universities in Sweden, oldest university in Sweden and the Nordic countries still in opera ...

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...

References

External links

MIT web page for Roman Jackiw

Biography of John Bell, including description of his 1969 work with Jackiw
* 1939 births Living people People from Lubliniec Cornell University alumni Fellows of the American Physical Society Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences American people of Ukrainian descent American people of Polish descent Mathematical physicists Swarthmore College alumni MIT Center for Theoretical Physics faculty {{physicist-stub