Cohl Furey, also known as Nichol Furey, [1] is a Canadian mathematical physicist. [2] [3]
Furey has a bachelor's degree in mathematics and physics from Simon Fraser University (2005), Master's degree from the University of Cambridge (2006) and a Ph.D in theoretical physics from the University of Waterloo (2015). [4] She was a research fellow at the University of Cambridge from 2016 to 2019 [5] and spent a few months at the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences in Cape Town. Since 2020, she has been at the Humboldt University of Berlin on a Freigeist-Fellowship by the Volkswagen Foundation. [1] [6]
Her main interests are division algebras, Clifford algebras, and Jordan algebras, and their relation to particle physics. Her work focuses on finding an underlying mathematical structure to the Standard Model of particle physics. She is most noted for her work on octonions. [7] [8] [9]
She has worked on attempting to obtain the Standard Model of particle physics from octonionic constructions. [2] [7] [9] In her 2018 paper "SU(3)C × SU(2)L × U(1)Y ( × U(1)X ) as a symmetry of division algebraic ladder operators," [10] according to Quanta Magazine , "she consolidated several findings to construct the full Standard Model symmetry group, SU(3) × SU(2) × U(1), for a single generation of particles, with the math producing the correct array of electric charges and other attributes for an electron, neutrino, three up quarks, three down quarks and their anti-particles. The math also suggests a reason why electric charge is quantized in discrete units — essentially, because whole numbers are." [2] In 2022 together with Mia Hughes, she linked the symmetry breaking in physics to division algebras including octonions. [11]
In 2019, Wired.com listed her in their article "10 Women in Science and Tech Who Should Be Household Names". [12]
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In mathematics, an octonion algebra or Cayley algebra over a field F is a composition algebra over F that has dimension 8 over F. In other words, it is a 8-dimensional unital non-associative algebra A over F with a non-degenerate quadratic form N such that
Tevian Dray is an American mathematician who has worked in general relativity, mathematical physics, geometry, and both science and mathematics education. He was elected a Fellow of the American Physical Society in 2010.
In physics, a gauge theory is a type of field theory in which the Lagrangian, and hence the dynamics of the system itself, do not change under local transformations according to certain smooth families of operations. Formally, the Lagrangian is invariant.
In particle physics, W′ and Z′ bosons refer to hypothetical gauge bosons that arise from extensions of the electroweak symmetry of the Standard Model. They are named in analogy with the Standard Model W and Z bosons.
In theoretical physics, a mass generation mechanism is a theory that describes the origin of mass from the most fundamental laws of physics. Physicists have proposed a number of models that advocate different views of the origin of mass. The problem is complicated because the primary role of mass is to mediate gravitational interaction between bodies, and no theory of gravitational interaction reconciles with the currently popular Standard Model of particle physics.
Symmetries in quantum mechanics describe features of spacetime and particles which are unchanged under some transformation, in the context of quantum mechanics, relativistic quantum mechanics and quantum field theory, and with applications in the mathematical formulation of the standard model and condensed matter physics. In general, symmetry in physics, invariance, and conservation laws, are fundamentally important constraints for formulating physical theories and models. In practice, they are powerful methods for solving problems and predicting what can happen. While conservation laws do not always give the answer to the problem directly, they form the correct constraints and the first steps to solving a multitude of problems.
Corinne Alison Manogue is an American physicist who has worked in general relativity, mathematical physics, and physics education. She was elected a Fellow of the American Physical Society in 2005, and was an inaugural Fellow of the American Association of Physics Teachers in 2014.
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