Lorentz Chair

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Lorentz Chair since 1955 2011 Roger Penrose 2010 Thomas A. Witten [lectures] 2009 Kip S. Thorne [lectures] 2008 F. Duncan M. Haldane [lectures] 2007 Thomas W.B. Kibble 2006 David R. Nelson 2005 Peter Zoller [lectures] 2004 Leonard Susskind 2003 Leo P. Kadanoff 2002 John P. Preskill 2001 Howard C. Berg 2000 Chandra M. Varma 1999 Michael V. Berry 1998 Frank Wilczek 1997 Bertrand I. Halperin 1996 Yoseph Imry 1995 N. David Mermin 1994 Julius Wess 1993 Michael E. Fisher 1992 Alexander F. Andreev 1991 Pierre C. Hohenberg 1990 Bernie J. Alder 1989 Martinus J.G. Veltman 1988 Claude Cohen-Tannoudji 1987 Raymond L. Orbach 1986 Philippe Nozières 1985 Ben Widom 1984 Chen Ning Yang 1983 Irwin Oppenheim 1982 Léon van Hove 1981 Ryogo Kubo 1980 Anatole Abragam 1979 Ezechiel G.D. Cohen 1978 Pierre-Gilles de Gennes 1977 Victor F. Weisskopf 1976 Rudolph E. Peierls 1975 John Bardeen 1974 Roy J. Glauber 1973 Nicolaas Bloembergen 1972 Felix Bloch 1971 David Pines 1970 Lars Onsager 1969 Isaak M. Khalatnikov 1968 Elliott W. Montroll 1967 Christian Møller 1966 Herbert Fröhlich 1965 Wladyslaw Opechowski 1964 Oskar Klein 1963 Mark Kac 1962 Léon Rosenfeld 1961 Elliott W. Montroll 1960 John H. van Vleck 1959 John G. Kirkwood 1958 Walter H. Heitler 1957 Eugene P. Wigner 1956 John A. Wheeler 1955 George E. Uhlenbeck » portrait gallery « of Nobel laureate Lorentz professors

Each year an eminent theoretical physicist holds the Lorentz Chair. The 2011 Lorentz professor is Sir Roger Penrose, from the University of Oxford.

Professor Penrose will give five lectures on

New Developments in Physics and Cosmology
Monday afternoons May 9, 16, 23, 30, and June 6, 2011 (13.45-15.30 hours, De Sitterzaal, Oortgebouw).
In addition, he will present a Colloquium Ehrenfestii on Wednesday evening May 11.

Extra: Public lecture on June 10

Topics of the five lectures (with abstracts):

In these lectures, various ideas will be described that challenge the conventional outlooks on physics in different areas, from the very small to the very large. A modification of standard quantum mechanics will be argued for, based on general relativistic principles, this having striking implications for cosmology, in relation to the second law of thermodynamics. The primacy of massless particles leads to a viewpoint that conformal (null-cone) space-time geometry is more over-reaching than its metric, suggesting a radically new cosmological picture. This geometry is also basic to twistor theory, for which new roles have recently been found, particularly in high-energy physics.

• May 9: Quantum Foundations: Influences from Gravitational Theory
• May 16: Conformal Cyclic Cosmology I: The General Scheme
• May 23: Conformal Cyclic Cosmology II: Detailed Equations at Crossover and Observational Implications
• May 30: Twistor Theory I: Twistor Geometry and the Wavefunctions of Massless Particles
• June 6: Twistor Theory II: More Recent Developments. General Relativity, High-Energy Physics, Twistor Strings

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Signatures of the Lorentz professors on the wall of our old colloquium room.