Charles Thorn

{{Short description|American theoretical physicist}} {{about||the professional golfer|Charles Thorn (golfer)|the New Zealand carpenter, undertaker and trade unionist|Charles Thorn (trade unionist)}} {{Infobox scientist |name = Charles Thorn |image = Charles Thorn.jpg |birth_date = {{b-da|14 August 1946}} |birth_place = Washington, Indiana, US |field = Physics |work_institutions = University of Florida |alma_mater = Massachusetts Institute of Technology<br>University of California, Berkeley |known_for = |doctoral_advisor = Stanley Mandelstam |doctoral_students = Jian Qiu<br>Francisco Rojas<br>Sourav Raha |prizes = Jesse W. Beams Medal, 2005<br>Dannie Heineman Prize for Mathematical Physics, 2026 }} '''Charles Thorn''' (born 14 August 1946) is an American physicist who is a Professor of Physics at University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida.<ref>[http://www.phys.ufl.edu/faculty/thorn.shtml Charles Thorn at University of Florida]</ref> He played an important role in the development of dual models and string theory.<ref>Goddard P. From dual models to string theory, ''The Birth of String Theory'' (18–19 May 2007)] {{Arxiv|0802.3249v1}} (accessed 16 April 2008)</ref> Among his contributions is the proof of the non-existence of ghosts in string theory. The Goddard–Thorn theorem is a result about certain vector spaces in string theory. Thorn developed it with Peter Goddard.

==Education and personal life== Thorn obtained his undergraduate degree in physics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and completed his Ph.D. in physics from University of California, Berkeley in 1971 under the supervision of Stanley Mandelstam. He has held postdoctoral positions at MIT and CERN.<ref>{{Cite book|last1=Cappelli|first1=Andrea|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WNZyoUteXIkC&q=%22Charles+Thorn%22+cern&pg=PA246|title=The Birth of String Theory|last2=Castellani|first2=Elena|last3=Colomo|first3=Filippo|last4=Vecchia|first4=Paolo Di|date=2012-04-12|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-0-521-19790-8|language=en}}</ref> He is fond of tango dancing.{{cn|date=August 2020}}

==Research== Charles Thorn also has developed an approach to string theory based on the idea of string bits.<ref>Strings Branes and Gravity. Jeffrey A. Harvey, Shamit Kachru, Eva Silverstein. World Scientific TASI 1999</ref><ref>Reformulating String Theory with the 1/N expansion. {{arXiv|hep-th/9405069}}</ref> This idea led him to the conclusion that in this formalism one of the dimensions of spacetime appears to be dynamic. The fundamental degrees of freedom propagated on a surface in one lower dimension thus giving a holographic theory.

He was elected a Fellow of the American Physical Society in 1989 ''"For important contributions to the theory of elementary particles. Nominated by: Division of Particles and Fields"'' <ref> {{cite web|url=https://www.aps.org/programs/honors/fellowships/archive-all.cfm?initial=&year=1989&unit_id=&institution=|title=APS Fellow Archive|publisher=APS|access-date= 5 October 2020}} </ref>

==References== {{Reflist}}

==External links== *{{GoogleScholar}} *[http://www.phys.ufl.edu/~thorn/ Personal Page of Charles Thorn] *[https://arxiv.org/find/all/1/all:+AND+charles+thorn/0/1/0/all/0/1 Publications on ArXiv] *[http://inspirehep.net/search?p=FIND+author+charles+b+thorn+and+topcit+500%2B+and+scl+s Spires]

{{DEFAULTSORT:Thorn, Charles}} Category:1946 births Category:Living people Category:University of California, Berkeley alumni Category:University of Florida faculty Category:American string theorists Category:21st-century American physicists Category:Fellows of the American Physical Society

{{US-theoretical-physicist-stub}} Category:People associated with CERN Category:People from Washington, Indiana Category:Massachusetts Institute of Technology alumni