Special Colloquium: Jacob Bourjaily

Title: The Surprising Simplicity of Scattering Amplitudes

Speaker: Jacob Bourjaily

Institution: Niels Bohr Institute

Place: Room 201, Building 12, Yuquan Campus

Time: Dec. 12^th, Wednesday, 3:00pm~4:00pm

Abstract:

The way that we understand, teach, and use quantum field theory to make predictions for experiments is rapidly changing in order to make the simplicity of our predictions less surprising (and hence also easier to compute). Indeed, whether for theoretical exploration or practical applications, the methods described in textbooks are no longer those being used by experts today.

In this talk, I will describe some of our recent advances that have been made to explain this simplicity and how they have been used to dramatically extend predictive reach. Much of this progress has so far been made for especially simple quantum field theories, but many of the lessons learned have much wider applicability. I will describe the status of these generalizations today, and the concrete roads ahead.

Biography:

Jacob Bourjaily is an Associate Professor of Physics at the Niels Bohr Institute of the University of Copenhagen in Denmark. He received his Ph.D. from Princeton University in 2011, under the supervision of Professor Nima Arkani-Hamed at the Institute for Advanced Study. Afterwards he was elected a Junior Fellow at the Harvard Society of Fellows, Harvard University, where he stayed until his current position in 2014. Jacob is one of the active young pioneers and experts in the study of the S-matrix in quantum field theories. He has made significant contributions to the geometric understanding of perturbative dynamics of elementary particles merged in recent years, as well as the development of the related theoretical/computational tools.

Welcome to attend!