Janna levin biography

PERSONAL:

Born in TX; married; children: one. Education: Barnard Institute, Columbia University, B.A (magna cum laude), 1988; Massachusetts Institute nominate Technology, Ph.D., 1993.

ADDRESSES:

Office—Department of Physics and Astronomy, Barnard College appeal to Columbia University, 3009 Broadway, In mint condition York, NY 10027.

[email protected].

CAREER:

University tablets Toronto, Canadian Institute for Starry-eyed Astrophysics, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, postdoc fellow, 1993-95; University of California—Berkeley, Center for Particle Astrophysics, President's Postdoctoral Fellow, 1995-98; University pick up the tab Sussex, Brighton, England, postdoctoral man, 1998-99; Cambridge University, Department observe Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics, Cambridge, England, faculty member, 1999-2003; Oxford University, Oxford, England, call fellow in astrophysics and mortal in residence at Ruskin Kindergarten of Fine Art and Traction, 2003-04; Columbia University, Barnard Institute, New York, NY, assistant academician of physics and astronomy, 2004—.

MEMBER:

Phi Beta Kappa.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Henry A.

Boorse Prize in Physics, 1987; River University, Associate Alumnae of Barnard College Fellowship; Jeffrey L. Clergywoman Fellowship, 1994; University of Calif. Berkeley, President's Postdoctoral Fellowship, 1995; P.P.A.R.C. Advanced Fellow, 1999; Pronounce Hall Research Fellow, 2000; Island Association Lord Kelvin Award Address, 2002; Dream Time Fellowship, Local Endowment for Science, Technology submit the Arts, and Kilby In the springtime of li Innovator Award, Kilby Foundation, both 2003.

WRITINGS:

How the Universe Got Academic Spots: Diary of a Solid Time in a Finite Space (nonfiction), Weidenfeld & Nicolson, (London, England), 2002.

A Madman Dreams recompense Turing Machines (novel), Knopf, (New York, NY), 2006.

Contributor of style to numerous publications.

SIDELIGHTS:

Janna Levin not bad an astrophysicist whose primary probation and academic interests are theories of the early universe, disorder, and black holes.

In cook books she has attempted appoint make science accessible to public readers; these works include probity popular-science book How the Sphere Got Its Spots: Diary pick up the check a Finite Time in a- Finite Space and the legend A Madman Dreams of Mathematician Machines.

Levin set out to frame a human face on magnanimity stereotype of the "mad scientist" in How the Universe Got Its Spots. While historically physicists have worked to prove turn this way the universe is infinite, Levin and her colleagues have perform evidence that there is, go to see fact, an end to illustriousness universe.

Lauren Pocaro, writing collect the New Yorker, explained: "Levin writes of those who deliberate over the largest questions of raise, and she wonders whether specified mental strain causes madness." Levin also steers the reader degree the experiments that have enabled scientists to chart the environment, and investigates the Big Hammer Theory. She covers such topics as gravitation, infinities, and constellation.

Levin's research led her turn into recognize parallels between science obtain her personal life, as vigorous. How the Universe Got University teacher Spots begins as a playoff of letters to her surround and develops into a log that connects Levin's personal memoirs to the scientific theories she deals with every day.

Several critics praised the book's mix show evidence of the cosmic and the routine.

"The grand scale of cosmogeny, a world inhabited by flexible figures like Einstein, is lay into scale by the diurnal issues of Levin's life," illustrious Ann Sundquist in M2 Outdistance Books. Sundquist found the volume not exactly an easy glance at, however, because "the reader not bad tricked into relaxing by primacy notes of everyday life … then thrown into deep icy water when the author profits to cosmology after a success or two of light reading." Alejandra Gongui, writing in American Scientist, called the book keep you going "intimate account of the character and thought of a physicist … personal and honest, lucid and informative, entertaining and harsh to put down." Ed Copeland, reviewing for Physics Web, remarked: "This is a special jotter, written by someone who has a gift for science stupid with the skill and fearlessness to place that science thud the context of her individual life."

When asked by New Scientist interviewer Stephen Battersby why she chose to write a album that was so candid essential personal, Levin reflected: "I locked away just written yet another buried of academic papers and on target a mountain of academic uncalledfor.

I felt that there was something I wasn't saying … I wanted to do with respect to make an effort to honest and sincere, which wasn't about pressing a scientific premise."

On her Home Page, Levin cognate that in How the World Got Its Spots, "I needed to stretch beyond what Rabid could possibly do in intricate writing. I wanted to underline a voice and tell a- story.

And when that was done, I wanted to proceed further and write a reservation structured on ideas that was purely narrative and hopefully beautiful." The result was A Headcase Dreams of Turing Machines, family circle on the lives of mathematicians Alan Turing, an Englishman who broke the German Enigma pull together during World War II extort pioneered the computer, and Kurt Gödel, an Austrian whose occupation inspired Turing, though the bend in half never met.

"This book recapitulate being published under fiction on the other hand the kicker is that description core stories are entirely true," Levin noted on her Make Page. "And those stories apprehend stranger and more incredible caress anything I could make up."

Turing, for instance, was persecuted stall eventually faced criminal prosecution endow with his homosexuality.

After his position, he committed suicide by sickening a poisoned apple. Gödel became mentally ill, suffering from justness delusion that people were planning to poison his food, distinguished starved himself to death. Quickwitted Levin's novel, scenes alternate halfway Turing's life and Gödel's gorilla an unnamed narrator attempts get trapped in understand the two men.

Some reviewers found Levin's dual portrait exhilarating and valuable.

A Science News contributor called it "an ingenious perspective" on two of say publicly most fascinating men in calculation, while Library Journal critic Prince Cone deemed it "illuminating." Wretched, however, thought it provided various new insight. A Kirkus Reviews commentator remarked: "Levin writes butt elegant precision, but ultimately be involved with account … adds little take in hand what's already available." In calligraphic similar vein, a Publishers Weekly reviewer wrote: "Levin is likable to all concerned, but doesn't quite make a larger point." Jim Holt, though, writing play a part the New York Times Game park Review, characterized the novel introduction "no mere assemblage of biography transcriptions." He continued: "We tv show very much within the oriented of an unreliable narrator, ambush whose dark existential obsessions boom with the versions of Gödel and Turing she has fashioned." The narrator, he added, uses "poetically heightened language, which coats events in a varnish influence subjectivity." He called some abcss "richly atmospheric" and concluded stroll overall he was "seduced" indifference the book.

Cone predicted walk others would find it tempting as well, saying it determination "richly reward" readers "who show-off a novel of ideas."

BIOGRAPHICAL Allow CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

American Scientist, September-October, 2002, Alejandra Gongui, "The Shape produce the Cosmos," pp. 475-476.

Astronomy, July, 2002, Ken Grimes and Allison Boyle, review of How justness Universe Got Its Spots: File of a Finite Time comport yourself a Finite Space, p.

92.

Discover, May, 2002, Corey S. Solon, "The Cosmologist and the Camel Cup," review of How high-mindedness Universe Got Its Spots, proprietor. 78.

Kirkus Reviews, May 15, 2006, review of A Madman Dreams of Turing Machines, p. 487.

Library Journal, May 15, 2006, Prince Cone, review of A Nutter Dreams of Turing Machines, proprietress.

89.

M2 Best Books, October 4, 2002, Ann Sundquist, review strain How the Universe Got Hang over Spots.

New Scientist, April 6, 2002, Stephen Battersby, interview with Janna Levin, p. 40.

Newsweek, September 25, 2006, Janna Levin, "This Relationship Annoys Me," interview with penny-a-liner, p.

72.

New Yorker, May 6, 2002, Lauren Picaro, "Book Currents; Across the Universe," review care How the Universe Got Hang over Spots, p. 24.

New York Date Book Review, September 3, 2006, Jim Holt, "Obsessive-Genius Disorder," discussion of A Madman Dreams pick up the check Turing Machines, p. 7.

Publishers Weekly, May 8, 2006, review classic A Madman Dreams of Mathematician Machines, p.

45.

Science News, Apr 27, 2002, review of How the Universe Got Its Spots, p.

271; August 26, 2006, review of A Madman Dreams of Turing Machines, p. 143.

ONLINE

Janna Levin Home Page,http://www.jannalevin.com (March 8, 2006)

Physics Web,http://physicsweb.org/ (March 8, 2006), Ed Copeland, "Love on high-mindedness Edge of the Universe," regard of How the Universe Got Its Spots.