Prof. Jacob Sonnenschein

Emeritus in School of Physics and Astronomy
ביה"ס לפיזיקה ואסטרונומיה אמריטוס
Prof. Jacob Sonnenschein
Phone: 03-6407782
Fax: 03-6407932
Office: Kaplun, 405

Research

Prof. Jacob Sonnenschein's research has been focused on the HISH (Holography Inspired Stringy Hadron) model. This is a modern version of the stringy description of hadrons: mesons, baryons, glueballs and exotic hadrons that he invented and developed. The research included setting up and developing the basic concepts and tools of the model, in particular the quantization of a bosonic string with particles on its ends. At the same time he has also applied the model to experimental data and found nice agreement with the spectra of all hadrons and their decay width. Using the powerful tool of the gauge/gravity duality, he has also investigated aspects of nuclear matter, in particular its crystalline structure and the phase transition to quark matter. Another topic he investigates is topological non-trivial classical solutions of pure Maxwell theory. He has developed a technique based on special conformal transformations to generate an infinite set of knot-like solutions of the electric and magnetic fields, and showed that similar configurations exist also in pressure-less hydrodynamics. He developed a Lagrangian formulation for the EM configurations which is the first step toward quantizing them.

Education

  • B.Sc. in Physics; Technion Israel Institute of Technology, 1972-1975

  • M.Sc. in High Energy Physics; Weizmann Institute, 1981-1982

  • Ph.D. in High Energy Physics; Weizmann Institute, 1983-1987

Academic Appointments

  • Teaching assistant Weizmann Institute, 1984-1986

  • Post-Doctoral research in Stanford Linear Accelerator center, 1987-1989

  • Post-Doctoral research, Dept. of Physics UCLA, 1989-1990

  • Senior lecturer, School of Physics Tel Aviv University, Sep. 1990

  • Tenure position, School of Physics Tel Aviv University, May. 1993

  • Associate Professor, School of Physics Tel Aviv University, Oct. 1993

  • Full Professor, School of Physics Tel Aviv University, Oct. 1998

  • Adviser, "Einstein center" Weizmann Institute of Science, 1990-1999

  • Member of the Institute for advanced study Princeton, 2001-2002

Awards and Prizes

  • Distinction in B.Sc studies, Technion- Institute of Technology, 1975

  • Best student Prize of school of Subnuclear Physics Erice Italy, 1985

  • Brener Prize for distinction in P.h.D studies, Weizmann Institute, 1986

  • Dr. Chaim Weizmann Post-doctoral Fellowship, 1987

  • Prof. J. Schwinger Post-Doctoral Fellowship, 1989

  • Israel Academy of Science, research grant, 1993

  • Binational Science Foundation USA-Israel research grant, 1993

  • German Israel Foundation, research grant, 1994

  • ISF Excellence center, Center of physics of basic interactions, 1995, 1997

  • ISF Excellence center, Center of physics of basic interactions, 1998,  2000

  • ISF Excellence center, 2000-2004, 2006-2009, 2010-2013

  • ISF Excellence center, 2004

  • ISF Excellence center, 2006

  • Deutch-Israeliche Projektkooperation DIP, 2006

  • German Israel Foundation research grant, 2007

  • Binational Science Foundation USA-Israel grant, 2008

  • ISF Excellence center, 2010

  • Binational Science Foundation USA-Israel grant, 2012

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