Shiraz Naval Minwalla
Member, School of Natural Sciences, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, and Professor, Department of Theoretical Physics, Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), Mumbai
Congratulatory message from the Jury Chair – Shrinivas Kulkarni
“I’d like to congratulate Dr. Shiraz Minwalla for winning this year’s Infosys Prize in Physical Sciences. One of the central problems of theoretical physics is to understand the force of gravity within the framework of quantum mechanics. However, efforts to quantize Einstein’s theory of general relativity using standard methods give neither a consistent nor a calculable theory of quantum gravity. Therefore, in recent years, there has been a huge effort to realize the theory of quantum gravity via a very different framework — that of string theory. Dr. Minwalla uncovered a totally unexpected connection between the equations of fluid and superfluid dynamics and Einstein’s theory of general relativity. It unifies two of the best studied non-linear partial differential equations in physics. The ramifications of this big connection is being eagerly studied by others in the field. Congratulations again, Dr. Shiraz Minwalla.”
Bio
Prof. Shiraz Naval Minwalla did his M.Sc. in Physics from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur and completed his Ph.D. in Physics from Princeton University. His current appointment is Professor at the Department of Theoretical Physics, TIFR. His past appointments included Staff Associate, International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP); Associate Professor at the Department of Theoretical Physics, TIFR; Assistant Professor at the Department of Physics, Harvard University; Reader at the Department of Theoretical Physics, TIFR and Junior Fellow, Harvard Society of Fellows.
He has been the recipient of awards such as the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize (2011), ICTP Prize 2010, Swarnajayanti Fellowship (2007) and Elected Fellow at the Indian Academy of Sciences (2011).
Scope and impact of the work
One of the central problems of theoretical physics is to understand the force of gravity within the framework of quantum mechanics. However, efforts to quantize Einstein’s theory of general relativity using standard methods give neither a consistent nor a calculable theory of quantum gravity. Therefore, in recent years, there has been a huge effort to realize a theory of quantum gravity via a very different framework, that of ’string theory’.
Several years ago, Prof. Juan Maldacena proposed the anti-de Sitter / conformal field theory (AdS / CFT) correspondence, a conjectured holographic relation between gravitational theory in the bulk of anti-de Sitter space and a conformal quantum field theory that resides on its boundary. Enormous effort has been invested to unravel the implications of this correspondence.
Prof. Shiraz Naval Minwalla established that, in the long wavelength hydrodynamic limit, a black hole in anti-deSitter space is governed by exactly the same equations as the nonlinear Navier-Stokes equations of a fluid. This AdS / CFT-like holographic view of fluid dynamics is called the fluid / gravity map. It unifies two of the best-studied nonlinear partial differential equations in physics.
Using the fluid / gravity map, Prof. Minwalla established a connection between the classical area theorems of black hole physics and the positivity of the divergence of the entropy current in fluid dynamics. This correspondence led to the correct form of the most general equations of relativistic charged hydrodynamics and superfluid dynamics. The complete theory has 23 parameters rather than an earlier simpler formulation with only 13 parameters.
Long citation
Prof. Shiraz Naval Minwalla is a leader in quantum gravity research. He has made deep contributions in the field of string theory, in particular to the study of the AdS / CFT correspondence.
Prof. Minwalla uncovered an unexpected connection between the equations of fluid and superfluid dynamics and Einstein’s equations of general relativity. His work revealed that in the hydrodynamic limit the geometry of a black hole in anti-deSitter space is governed by exactly the same equations as a Navier-Stokes fluid.
He is among those who initiated the study of three-dimensional Chern-Simons field theories coupled to fundamental matter fields in the large N limit. This led to the discovery of a surprising new non-supersymmetric strong-weak coupling duality between bosons and fermions coupled to Chern-Simons gauge fields.
Prof. Minwalla has made path-breaking contributions to the study of black holes in the context of the AdS / CFT correspondence, the enumeration of supersymmetric states in superconformal field theories, the study of noncommutative field and string theories, and correlation functions in supersymmetric field theories.
