2008 Foundational Questions in Physics and Cosmology
Awardee ![]() ![]() |
Institution | Value ![]() ![]() |
Project Title |
Gaurav Khanna | University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth | $15,166 | Numerical Techniques for Solving Models of Quantum Gravity |
Peter Byrne | Oxford University Press | $35,000 | The Devil's Pitchfork: Multiple Universes, Mutually Assured Destruction, and the Meltdown of a Nuclear Family |
Richard Woodard | University of Florida | $37,128 | Fundamental Particles as Probes of Quantum Gravity |
Olaf Dreyer | MIT | $50,000 | Quantum Space II |
Laura Mersini-Houghton | UNC at Chapel Hill | $50,000 | The Puzzle of the Initial Conditions and the Multiverse |
Saswat Sarangi | Columbia University | $50,000 | Transport Properties of the Multiverse |
Tevian Dray | Oregon State University | $51,393 | Using Octonionic Cayley Spinors to Describe Fundamental Particles |
Michael Reisenberger | Theiss Research | $55,918 | Classical and Quantum Gravity Without Constraints |
Raphael Bousso | UC Berkeley | $60,067 | Why is the Universe Large? |
Ken Olum | Tufts University | $60,274 | Does General Relativity Permit Exotic Phenomena? |
Alexander Vilenkin | Tufts University | $63,000 | The Measure Problem in the Inflationary Multiverse |
Glenn Starkman | Case Western Reserve University | $64,760 | Can Cosmology Survive Without Birkhoff's Law? |
Stephon Alexander | Haverford College | $65,000 | Foundational Questions in Cosmology and Quantum Gravity |
Giovanni Amelino-Camelia | University La Sapienza | $65,000 | Falsifiable Quantum-Gravity Theories of Not Everything |
Yong-Shi Wu | University of Utah | $68,744 | Stochastic Approach to Quantum Gravity and Cosmology |
Markus Aspelmeyer | IQOQI | $69,187 | Experimental Metaphysics at the Quantum-Classical Border |
Caslav Brukner | University of Vienna | $69,600 | Theories of Systems with Limited Information Content - Quantum Theory and Beyond |
Paul Davies | Arizona State University | $70,000 | Cosmological and Astrophysical Implications of Quantum Post-Selection |
Wojciech Zurek | Los Alamos National Laboratory | $75,000 | Quantum Darwinism |
A. Garrett Lisi | Theiss Research | $77,222 | E8 Theory |
Subir Sachdev | Harvard University | $80,934 | Quantum Criticality and Black Holes |
Ted Jacobson | University of Maryland at College Park | $82,127 | Growth of the Vacuum in Quantum Cosmology |
Jenny Harrison | UC Berkeley | $85,000 | Axioms of Calculus and Mechanics |
Bob Coecke | Oxford University | $89,981 | The Road to a New Quantum Formalism: Categories as a Canvas for Quantum Foundations |
Julian Barbour | Oxford University | $99,563 | Machian Quantum Gravity |
Jonathan Dowling | LSU | $102,061 | Quantum Measurement in the Timeless Universe |
Antony Valentini | Imperial College London | $113,138 | Hidden Variables in the Early Universe |
Alexander Maloney | McGill University | $117,120 | The Holographic Wave Function of the Universe |
John Baez | UC Riverside | $131,865 | Categorifying Fundamental Physics |
Thomas LaBean | Duke University | $134,326 | Experimentally Probing the Origins of Macromolecular Structure |
Keith Schwab | Cornell University | $161,012 | Probing Quantum Mechanics with Mechanical Structures |
Andrei Linde | Stanford University | $164,179 | Multiverse, Inflation, Life and Probabilities |
Dmitry Budker | UC Berkeley | $170,000 | A Laboratory Search for Temporal and Spatial Variation of the Fine-Structure Constant Using Atomic Dysprosium |
TOTAL | $2,683,765 |
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