Spring Break
Professor develops theory and rapport
By: Kenny Ryan
Issue date: 10/25/07 Section: News
In addition to his role as a professor, Pope is also the director of the George and Cynthia Woods Mitchell Institute for Fundamental Physics and Astronomy. Pope has used this position to reach out to his alma mater, and A&M and Cambridge have worked together as a result of Pope's efforts.
"With George Mitchell's very generous help, matched by Texas A&M University, we established a collaboration in theoretical cosmology between Cambridge and A&M," Pope said. "We host workshops and conferences, and faculty and student exchange visits."
"He's a magnet that attracts people," said Ford. "There's a big collaboration between A&M and Cambridge. We have had several well attended conferences; [Stephen] Hawking has come twice. We have lots of high profile people that help connect A&M with the rest of the world."
"My motivation is the puzzle of gravity and quantum theory," Pope said. "[They are] the two great cornerstones of modern physics, but they don't want to match up. String Theory is the only realistic prospect for a unified theory. It's a subject in its infancy which is very exciting because it's a matter of constant exploration and has been very rewarding, generating lots of new ideas in math and science."
Pope said he doesn't expect the mystery to be solved soon, but he continues to adamantly work towards a solution.
"It was 100 years between Maxwell's unification of electricity and magnetism, and the next landmark in unification by Salam and Weinberg [who won a Nobel Prize for taking Maxwell's work one step further] in the 1960s," Pope said. "I think the problem of unifying gravity and quantum theory is much more complex, but it's all a great adventure and we learn a lot along the way."
Pope said there are many reasons to research String Theory.
"Quantum gravity is the great unsolved problem in fundamental physics," Pope said. "[For someone] to go into it, they need a love of intellectual problems for their own sake and an enthusiasm for understanding how the world works. It's a very interesting time: new observations and discoveries in astronomy are opening windows not opened before. I think we will see a marriage of cosmology and string theory into a very fruitful and fertile era of development."
"With George Mitchell's very generous help, matched by Texas A&M University, we established a collaboration in theoretical cosmology between Cambridge and A&M," Pope said. "We host workshops and conferences, and faculty and student exchange visits."
"He's a magnet that attracts people," said Ford. "There's a big collaboration between A&M and Cambridge. We have had several well attended conferences; [Stephen] Hawking has come twice. We have lots of high profile people that help connect A&M with the rest of the world."
"My motivation is the puzzle of gravity and quantum theory," Pope said. "[They are] the two great cornerstones of modern physics, but they don't want to match up. String Theory is the only realistic prospect for a unified theory. It's a subject in its infancy which is very exciting because it's a matter of constant exploration and has been very rewarding, generating lots of new ideas in math and science."
Pope said he doesn't expect the mystery to be solved soon, but he continues to adamantly work towards a solution.
"It was 100 years between Maxwell's unification of electricity and magnetism, and the next landmark in unification by Salam and Weinberg [who won a Nobel Prize for taking Maxwell's work one step further] in the 1960s," Pope said. "I think the problem of unifying gravity and quantum theory is much more complex, but it's all a great adventure and we learn a lot along the way."
Pope said there are many reasons to research String Theory.
"Quantum gravity is the great unsolved problem in fundamental physics," Pope said. "[For someone] to go into it, they need a love of intellectual problems for their own sake and an enthusiasm for understanding how the world works. It's a very interesting time: new observations and discoveries in astronomy are opening windows not opened before. I think we will see a marriage of cosmology and string theory into a very fruitful and fertile era of development."
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