Sievert Prize Lectures
Effective Field Theory: A Universal Language of Physics
Join us each week for an exciting educational lecture by Alexander C. Edison, a theoretical physicist working in our Amplitudes and Insights group on formal relativistic quantum field theory and quantum gravity, binary black hole physics, and late-time cosmology.
- January 11, 2025- Norris Northwestern Room 2-160 "Models and Predictions"
- In our quest to uncover the fundamental properties of nature, physicists rely on learning to distinguish between known knowns, known unknowns, and unknown unknowns. In this lecture, we will explore how to effectively describe the same system at many different scales, and the surprising connections this can lead to.
- January 18, 2025- Norris Northwestern Room 2-160 "Gravity from Newton to Einstein"
- We begin with a thought experiment: could we guess Newton’s theory of gravity without observing the planets and stars? From there, we explore how correcting small problems with Newtonian gravity leads us to Einstein’s general relativity.
- January 25, 2025- Norris Lake Room 2-180 "Ripples from a Maelstrom"
- General relativity predicts that black holes are some of the simplest objects in the universe, while their cousins, neutron stars, are some of the most complex. However, telling them apart from here on Earth requires understanding the subtly different way they produce gravitational waves. Measuring these waves requires the most precise rulers ever built.
- February 1, 2025- Norris Northwestern Room 2-160 "Looking at Ever Smaller Scales"
- For more than a hundred years, particle physicists have been smashing things together to figure out what makes up everything. At first, we were swamped with the number of new particles that appeared, but we were saved by a radically simple theory, the Standard Model, and a single minus sign.
- February 8, 2025- Norris Northwestern Room 2-160 "The Standard Model is Almost Perfect"
- The Standard Model of particle physics is one of the most precisely tested theories of nature, but there are still dark corners and unexplained pieces. What strange new models might clean up the messes hiding under the rug?
- February 15, 2025- Norris Northwestern Room 2-160 "Baby Pictures of the Universe"
- The earliest moments of the universe were incredibly chaotic, a time when matter and energy were indistinguishable. Learning about this period of time could answer many questions about the nature of the universe. Luckily, we have a window into that time through the Cosmic Microwave Background.
- February 22, 2025- Norris Northwestern Room 2-160 "Galaxies: Glitter in a Snow Globe"
- We find many answers about the early universe in a surprising place: the arrangement of galaxies in the night sky. But in order to take a peek, we need to know how the universe evolved from then to now. Our current best model? Galaxies are motes of light floating in a perfect liquid.
- March 1, 2025- Norris Northwestern Room 2-160 "A Bright Future Ahead"
- We close this lecture series with a look towards the future: exciting experiments on the horizon and mind-bending new perspectives from which to view the universe.
These lectures are free and open to the public. Free parking is available in the South Campus Parking Garage (1841 Sheridan Rd, Evanston).
The Norris University Center is located at 1999 Campus Dr, Evanston, IL. Click here for directions
View the Sievert Prize Lecture Archive
The Department of Physics and Astronomy thanks Paul R. Sievert for his generous support of the Sievert Prize at Northwestern University. Paul Sievert created this endowment in memory of his wife, Ilene B. Sievert in 2020 in order to strengthen the Physics and Astronomy program at Northwestern for the benefit of the Northwestern community and the general public. This prize is awarded to one or more postdoctoral researchers in the department.
About the Ilene B. Sievert Prize Lectures
This series of lectures was established and endowed by Paul R. Sievert to honor the memory of his late wife Ilene (9/5/1940 - 12/16/2012).
Ilene was an undergraduate at the University of Chicago when she married another undergraduate, a physics student, Paul, in 1960. She had started in biology but switched to her second major interest, English literature after her marriage.
She obtained her B.A. and then took a job in the Computer Institute eventually working as one of Nick Metropolis’s programmers. She programmed an early machine, the Maniac III. Paul went on to graduate school at U. of Chicago.
Eventually Paul and Ilene came to Evanston in 1974. Paul became CEO of Allied Valve Industries in Chicago while Ilene was a housewife and mother. After her children were sufficiently grown she went back to her first interest, biology, specifically herpetology. She raised and studied poison dart frogs and published a number of papers on herpetology in the journal of the Chicago Herpetological Society. She had a lively interest in evolutionary theory, one of her favorite books being the Origin of Species by Darwin. Others included the evolutionary writings of Gould and Dawkins. She also followed her husband’s continuing interest in physics.
Ilene also served for a time as the president of the PTA for Park School in Evanston. Park School is for mentally handicapped children and is where her son attended. She had many friends in Evanston and some from her time at U of C, including John Ketterson, a current faculty member in the physics department at Northwestern University. Her interest in science and the knowledge that she certainly would have attended these lectures is one of the main motivations for the endowment of this prize.
The purpose of these lectures is to present to the interested general public cutting edge research results in hard science by an up-and-coming researcher in the field.
The topics could cover any field in science: biology, physics, chemistry, astronomy, mathematics, etc. The number of lectures and the depth of presentation is such that the intelligent general public should be able to follow and come away with an understanding and appreciation for a current subject of research and its importance. Though this prize program is being administered by the Physics Department of Northwestern University, other hard science departments of Northwestern will be consulted as prize recipients and lecture subject.