PCS Colloquium Talk

Speaker:
J. Michael Kosterlitz, Brown University, USA

Title:
Topological Defects and Phase Transitions

Abstract:
This talk reviews some of the applications of topology and topological defects in phase transitions in two-dimensional systems for which Kosterlitz and Thouless split half the 2016 Physics Nobel Prize. The theoretical predictions and experimental verification in two dimensional superfluids, superconductors and crystals will be reviewed because they provide very convincing quantitative agreement with topological defect theories.

Date & time:
July 6 Friday 3 pm

Location:
Auditorium, IBS Science Culture Center (2nd floor), Institute for Basic Science (IBS), Expo-ro 55, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon

Contact:
pcs@ibs.re.kr (+82-42-878-8633)

※ J. Michael Kosterlitz
- Born in 1943, Aberdeen, United Kingdom
- Full title is: Harrison E. Farnsworth Professor of Physics at Brown University
- Professor Kosterlitz received a BA,and an MA,at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge. He earned a D.Phil. from theOxford University as a postgraduate student of Brasenose College, Oxford. During his time at the University of Birmingham,he collaborated with David Thouless, and a postdoctoral student at Cornell University. He was appointed to the faculty of the University of Birmingham in 1974, first as a lecturer and, later, as a reader. Since 1982, he has been professor of physics at Brown University. Kosterlitz does research in condensed matter theory, one- and two-dimensional physics, in phase transitions: random systems, electron localization, and spin glasses and in critical dynamics: melting and freezing. He has been awarded the Maxwell Medal from the British Institute of Physics, and the Lars Onsager Prize from the American Physical Society both for his work on the Kosterlitz–Thouless transition. He was also awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2016 shared with David Thouless and Duncan Haldane for work on the Kosterlitz-Thouless transition. In 2017 he was elected a member of the National Academy of Sciences.