Lisa Randall

Lisa Randall studies theoretical particle physics and cosmology at Harvard University. Her research connects theoretical insights to puzzles in our current understanding of the properties and interactions of matter. She has developed and studied a wide variety of models to address these questions, the most prominent involving extra dimensions of space. Her work has explored improving our understanding of the Standard Model of particle physics, supersymmetry, baryogenesis, cosmological inflation, and dark matter. Randall’s research also explores ways to experimentally test and verify ideas and her current research focuses in large part on the Large Hadron Collider and dark matter searches and models.

Randall has had a public presence through her writing, lectures, and radio and TV appearances. Her books, Warped Passages: Unraveling the Mysteries of the Universe’s Hidden Dimensions and Knocking on Heaven’s Door: How Physics and Scientific Thinking Illuminate the Universe and the Modern World were both on The New York Times’ list of 100 Notable Books of the Year. Higgs Discovery: The Power of Empty Space was released as a Kindle Single as an update with recent particle physics developments.

Randall has received numerous awards and honors for her scientific endeavors. She is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Philosophical Society, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, was a fellow of the American Physical Society, and is a past winner of an Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Research Fellowship, a National Science Foundation Young Investigator Award, a Department of Energy (DOE) Outstanding Junior Investigator Award, and the Westinghouse Science Talent Search. In 2003, she received the Premio Caterina Tomassoni e Felice Pietro Chisesi Award, from the University of Rome, La Sapienza. In 2006, she received the Klopsteg Award from the American Society of Physics Teachers (AAPT) for her lectures and in 2007 she received the Julius Lilienfeld Prize from the American Physical Society for her work on elementary particle physics and cosmology and for communicating this work to the public.

Randall has also pursued art-science connections, writing a libretto for “Hypermusic: A Projective Opera in Seven Planes” that premiered in the Pompidou Center in Paris and co-curating an art exhibit “Measure for Measure” for the Los Angeles Arts Association.

Randall was on the list of Time Magazine‘s “100 Most Influential People” of 2007 and was one of 40 people featured in The Rolling Stone 40th Anniversary issue that year. She was featured in Newsweek‘s “Who’s Next in 2006” as “one of the most promising theoretical physicists of her generation” and in Seed Magazine‘s “2005 Year in Science Icons”. In 2008, Randall was among Esquire Magazine‘s “75 Most Influential People. Randall earned her Ph.D. from Harvard University and held professorships at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Princeton University before returning to Harvard in 2001.