Ganapathy Baskaran on physics, biology, and global science

Ganapathy Baskaran is an acclaimed physicist known for his foundational contributions to condensed matter physics, strongly correlated quantum materials, and high-temperature superconductivity. He is an Emeritus Professor at the Institute of Mathematical Sciences in Chennai, India, and a Distinguished Visiting Research Chair at Perimeter. He is also a masterful storyteller who, in this episode, tells Lauren and Colin about his upbringing in India, the people who inspire him, and his time in the developing world. Baskaran reflects on a lifetime of exploring some of nature’s most fundamental mysteries, and discusses the similarities and differences that he sees between condensed matter physics and biology. View the episode transcript here.

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Conversations at the Perimeter is co-hosted by Perimeter Teaching Faculty member Lauren Hayward and journalist-turned-science communicator Colin Hunter. In each episode, they chat with a guest scientist about their research, the challenges they encounter, and the drive that keeps them searching for answers.

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Baskaran expresses deep gratitude for the people who helped him on his journey, like his high school math teacher, Mr. S.V. Savarimuthu, and his English teacher, Rev. Fr. K.S. Arulanandam, S.J. Baskaran also reached out after our recorded conversation to extend his thanks to others who have impacted his career, including Dr. Rajaram Nityananda, a contemporary graduate student (from National Aeronautical Laboratory, Bangalore) during his PhD days in Bangalore. “Rajaram is one of the most selfless persons I have ever met,” says Baskaran. It was Rajaram who introduced Baskaran to seminal work by P.W. Anderson, a later collaborator of Baskaran’s. 

“In 1977, H.R. Krishnamurthy arrived from Cornell and explained to us the intricacies of the Kondo phenomenon, valence fluctuation, and how to understand them using the quantum RG approach (built on Anderson’s poor man’s scaling theory) that Krishnamurthy, Wilkinson, and Wilson had just developed. Anderson’s masterly role in modern condensed matter physics was manifest. Strong correlation physics, including Mott insulators, was in the air,” Baskaran says. 

Later in his career, Baskaran worked with professors who played a “lifting role” in his life, including R. Rajaraman, G. Rajasekaran, and Erio Tosatti.

“I am thankful to my school, college, teachers, friends, my family, my mom Leelavathy, my dad Ganapathy, siblings, uncles, aunts, cousins, nephews, my wife Whiterose, my children, their spouses, and my grandchildren.”

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
(inspiring music)

(00:08):
- Hello and welcome toConversations at the Perimeter.
Today, we're so excited to share with you
this conversation with Gunpathy Baskaran.
He's based out of the Instituteof Mathematical Sciences
and the Indian Institute ofTechnology in Chennai, India
and we're so lucky
that he visits PerimeterInstitute regularly
as a distinguishedvisiting research chair.

(00:29):
- Baskaran is one of themost interesting people
I think I've ever talked to.
He's not only a fascinating scientist
who's research delves
into condensed matterphysics and superconductivity
and even the concepts of quantum biology,
but he's just sort of a master storyteller
whose enthusiasm and passion for science
is really infectious.

(00:49):
- I think it's rare to meet a physicist
who's such a great storyteller,
and I loved hearing stories
about the role that collaboration
has played throughout his career
and also about why he loveshaving discussions with students
to inspire his research.
- And what really comes across too
is the gratitude that he has
for the people that havehelped him along his journey
and now he's trying to pay that forward.
He's very passionate about supporting

(01:11):
opportunities for young scientistsin the developing world,
and he speaks quite passionatelyabout those opportunities
and what they mean for young researchers
trying to pursue big questions.
- So without further ado,
let's step inside theperimeter with Baskaran.
So, hi Baskaran.
Thank you so much forsitting down with us today.

(01:32):
- So thank you Lauren and thank you Colin
for inviting me.
It's a pleasure to be here.
- So you have a uniqueposition here at Perimeter.
You're a distinguishedvisiting research chair.
And so that means you'renot here all of the time,
but I know you visit here very frequently
and I think your currentvisit is ending tomorrow.
So I wanted to start out by asking you

(01:53):
if you could tell us alittle bit about this visit
and some of the highlights.
- I was missing Perimeter Institute
for the last three years
so I was making a personalvisit to Los Angeles.
I thought I'll visit mydaughter there for a month.
Then because of COVID, westayed happily for four months.
Then I heard the newsthat Perimeter is opening.
So immediately I wrotePerimeter and I'm here.

(02:16):
And I'm very honored to beassociated with Perimeter
for nearly a dozen years.
It's a great place.
I tell wherever I go.
It's a great example to be emulated,
from the way it's funded
and the way theoreticalsciences are practiced.
So it's really an openended respect for science
as something that helps humanity.

(02:37):
So yeah, respect isshown in real terms here.
So I like this place and I havebeen coming very regularly.
In terms of my research activities,
it really helped me a lot
because I meet a lot of people,meet a lot of young people.
- Can you explain that a bit,
why meeting people face to face
and traveling essentiallyhalfway around the world to do so
is important to your work?

(02:58):
You mentioned young people in specific.
Why young people?
- Theoretical physics by definition
involves lots of imagination
and young people havedefinitely a lot of imagination.
I'm reminded of onequotation from Picasso.
He started as a realistic painter.
Then he got bored with it,
he started painting abstract pictures.

(03:18):
Apparently, one of his aims was
that he wants to be asimaginative as children
and he could never beat them.
In his mind, he wanted tomimic them and copy them,
but he could never beat their imagination.
So in the same way, whenyou meet young people here,
they have wild ideas, it'snice to talk about it.
Many of them these daysare extremely mathematical

(03:39):
because mathematics is very enticing.
Physics is an experimental science.
Mathematics and physicsexperiments go hand in hand.
When you meet young people,
there are people who aremotivated by experiments,
there are people who are motivated
by theories and mathematics.
So it's fun to see.
The variety is mind boggling.
I always compare it tothe wild flowers I see
when I go out in the spring.

(04:01):
There's nothing like, you know,the most beautiful flower.
Every flower is beautiful.
It's very difficult to saythat this is good, this is bad.
As long as there is apursuit in a sincere fashion,
things will grow andthat's what is happening.
- You said theoretical physics
requires a lot of imagination,
youthful imagination,
but it also requires a lot of rigor
and mathematics and experience.

(04:23):
Is there a push and pullthere between your experience
and their youthful imagination?
- When you said rigor,
in fact, recently Iwas doing a conference,
I was making a commentabout meaning of rigor.
There is conceptual rigor, physical rigor,
and mathematical rigor.
My colleagues,
some of them are veryrigorous in mathematics,
they will make very sharp statements.

(04:44):
There are people who will make very
conceptually rigorous statements,
mathematically may be very loose.
So physics has all of them.
Turns out, if you look atthe development of physics,
conceptual rigor plays very important role
and mathematical rigor orusing appropriate mathematics
has been extremely important.
One good example is Maxwell's equations.

(05:05):
We had Faraday's law, Ampere'slaw, Biot-Savart's law
and then Gauss's law.
And Maxwell had the geniusto put them together
in the then new calculus into one form,
it became Maxwell's equationand changed the world.
So mathematical rigor
in the sense of usingappropriate mathematics
is very important in physics.
In terms of calculus, itwas available to Einstein,

(05:26):
he used it.
Hilbert space was available,
people like (indistinct) andHeisenberg, they used it.
So using the rightmathematics in the right place
is something very important.
So it did not be rigorous
in the sense of mymathematical physics friends
call it as rigorous, or like existence,
showing that somethingexists and is unique,
that's the next level.
What often worries, this is not the,

(05:47):
they exists in their imagination,
it exists in their mind,they want to bring it out.
Very often, you know intuitively
what is going to be the result,
so you strive towards it,
you are guided by mathematics towards it
and this very often happens.
- In preparation for our conversation,
you sent us a few articlesthat you had written.
And one thing that stoodout to me right away

(06:08):
is that there were notmany mathematical equations
in those papers.
So this was actually something
I already wanted to ask you about
is if maybe this is somethingthat you tend to prefer
or you find yourself moredrawn to a conceptual,
rigorous way of thinking?
- Yeah, because as I said,
there are many ways of lookingat the structures in science.

(06:28):
For example, one of my papers
where I said that allcondensed matter phenomena
mirror in biology in some way or other,
simply because biology hadthree billion years of time
to think through and workthrough, evolve and so on.
So we are strugglingfor the last 500 years
in modern scientific methods,
so you have discovered many things,
but biology has found it.

(06:49):
So I do not know
what mathematics willhelp me to think about it.
To me, there are many conceptual issues
which are very important,
but of course, withoutmathematics, they will stay there.
You have to put it inthe form of mathematics,
elementary, simple models andif possible, new mathematics.
That will take a long way.
This combination of mathematicsand conceptualization

(07:10):
is something very fundamentalin theoretical physics.
I do not know if it is called rigorous,
but the conceptualizationand using right mathematics,
maybe inventing new mathematics.
- That idea
that you said everythingin condensed matter physics
has a mirror in biology,
I had never thought of it that way
until you sent us this paper.
And then thankfully for me,that wasn't full of math

(07:31):
and I was able to follow along.
And it really hadn'toccurred to me that, yeah,
evolution has had billionsof years of a head start
on our physics.
And it almost feels likeeven though we're doing
incredibly intricate and complex physics,
we're still playing catch up
to what nature has built already.
How did you go down that line of thought?
How did that first enter your?

(07:52):
- Oh it goes to my teachers.
I was fortunate enough to become a student
at Indian Institute ofScience at Bangalore.
I had a wonderful mentorand teacher, Narendra Kumar.
He was not my official guide.
He started as an electrical engineer
and he ended up as a maintenance engineer

(08:12):
in a national chemical laboratory.
Then there was a theoreticalphysics was doing theoretical.
We joined him and wrote a very quick PHD
in theoretical physics,
then he started workingon cosmology and biology.
So he essentially showedus that science is one.
There is a web of science,
every science is connectedwith everything else.
So he was a source of inspiration for us.

(08:34):
So we had this inhibitioncompetition into biology and math
and so I was removed by my teachers.
The five years that during my PhD days,
I was like a playboy,you know, in the sense of
never focused on my research,
but seriously took otherthings, other courses
and enjoying it all the way
because I had a good fellowship.
- So you were earning a PhD in one subject

(08:56):
and learning about allthe others at the same?
- All the other things except for-
- Except for what youwere supposed be doing?
- To the extent my PhD paper,
he's a great man,
he's 95 now, he's still in Bangalore.
So he was worried, he let me loose,
he gave me full independence,
but he thought at some pointI should write my thesis.
So at the end of three years he asked me,
"Why don't you write your thesis?"
I said, "I'm not satisfied."

(09:17):
So he waited for six moremonths, asked the same question.
Then after one year, thatmeans at the end of four years.
I said, "Professor, I'm not satisfied,
I want to do some more work."
Then, apparently he thought in his mind,
this fellow is gone case,he will never get a PhD.
- He'd given up on you?
- No, he didn't do,

(09:38):
he couldn't do anythingbecause he was a kind man,
so I was doing enjoying physics.
Then, you know, I do notknow if I can say this,
in India, marriages arefixed, are arranged,
so marriage was arranged.
So then I thought that beforeI submit myself to some lady,
I should submit my thesis.
So literally in threemonths I wrote my thesis

(10:00):
in preparation to get married.
- I've never heard,
no one has ever told us I gotmy PhD so I could get married.
You're the first one to mention that.
- No, it's that way
because I thought if I get married,
then there'll be other competitions,
I will have no time to finish my PhD.
And my guide was very good.
He grabbed this opportunity
and corrected my entirethesis in three days

(10:21):
and gave it back to me so thatI can type the manuscript.
So he was waiting for an opportunity.
So I had good people in all along.
- When we first sat down to chat with you,
we got speaking right away andthe conversation was flowing
and we got talking aboutbiology and quantum biology
and I said to you,
"Is this your specialty,your line of research?"
And you said, "Oh no, no,that's not my bread and butter.

(10:42):
That's something else I do."
And it amazed me that yoursort of professional focus
has been largely condensed matter and-
- Strongly correlated electron system.
- Yeah, super conductivity questions,
but your interests are so broad.
And so we continued carrying on
about this subject of quantum biology.

(11:02):
Has it been that way your wholelife, even prior to the PhD,
where you're just interestedin a wide range of subjects?
- No, it's very interesting question.
Prior to PhD, I was in agood college in Madurai,
where I had a masters, very good teachers.
So I took the subject seriously
and I learned whatever I was learning.

(11:23):
I had no particular fascinationabout quantum mechanics
or mathematical physics.
So I had no vision what to do.
In fact, it's after coming to Bangalore,
my ideas got sharpened.
In fact, that's also anaccident coming to Bangalore.
I was about to finish my first year
so I had no idea what I will do.
So one day my professor, RichardPieris, he's a great man,

(11:45):
it was a missionary college,
Madurai American College.
Missionaries used toinvite like scientists
to spend one year around sabbatical.
So Richard Pieris was ascientist at Bell Laboratories,
came to Chennai and Maduraifor one year to teach physics.
Then he fell in love with Madurai
and stayed there for 35 years.
So that was Richard Pieris.
He started postgraduatedepartment of physics at Madurai

(12:08):
and then he was my professor,very inspiring professor.
So one day he asked me,"What are your plans?"
Honestly I had no plans.
So I told him, "I may becomea tutor in a college."
It's like a junior lecturer.
"Suppose you don't getit, what will you do?"
I said, "I may become a research scholar
in Madurai University becauseI saw an advertisement
they say about some fellowshipso I may go for that."
"Suppose you don't getit, what will you do?"

(12:30):
I had no idea.
And he asked me,
"Do you know about IndianInstitute of Science at Bangalore?
Have you heard about it?"
I said, "No."
"So you have some motivation,
you have some energy,
so why don't you apply for a PhD program?"
So that's how I ended up
in Indian Institute of Science Bangalore.
The time took me,
I never planned foranything in my whole life.
I'm carried by time.
I was not thinking about job at all,

(12:50):
I was enjoying whatever I was doing.
Physics department won'tinvite me for an interview
'cause they had a way of screening.
My marks at junior collegelevel was not satisfactory
so I was screened out on that basis.
Then mathematics department selected me.
They didn't have too many applications
so I got in.
The head department pass away,
so the director of theinstitute, Satish Dhawan.

(13:12):
So he was sitting in the entry committee
and I answered questionsso I was selected.
After four months, I wasfascinated by a course
on quantum body theorygiven by Professor N. Kumar
whom I was mentioning.
So I was so fascinated by it,
I wanted to change to physicsdepartment if possible.
So I directly went tothe head of department
who was the director.
So he called the department,

(13:34):
"Baskaran is interestedin shifting, will you?"
He said, "No, no, we won't call him
because he was not evencalled for interview.
We have different standards."
So he said,
"As a director, I'm requesting you,
please have a second interview for him."
So they had a second interview for me
and then I was selected.
And that meant that Satish Dhawan,
he's the father of Indian Space Mission.
He was a very effectiveman, very selfless.

(13:55):
He became the chairman
of Indian Space Research Organization.
And in India, among the variousministries, organizations,
space research is one of the best.
It's because of Satish Dhawan.
- You know, I love this story
that you know, some departments
maybe overlooked you atfirst just because of marks.
and I think that we tend to look at marks

(14:16):
as the first thing whenselecting students,
but I'm not sure that it'sreally the best metric.
So what do you think
we really should be looking for instead?
- Yeah, that's a very good question.
So as much as possible, oneshould interact with students.
In our own institute,
we often don't give toomuch importance to marks.
We are very liberated
in terms of gettingstudents for interview.
There will be studentswith very low marks,

(14:36):
but you can see theirtalents very clearly.
Of course, you knowit's very difficult to,
when you have a big organization,there are rules and so on,
it's very difficult to overcome this.
But as much as possible,one should talk to people.
In fact, I know of someuniversities in India
where they do this,
they invite students
and then they have about50 students in a group

(14:58):
and they go with the professors,
they spend half a day together.
That makes a difference
other than looking at theapplication and marks and so on.
One pyramid and scholars international,
I know that they don't depend on mark,
they depend on recommendation letters,
which is another very important thing.
- And if you were 18, 19 years old now,
would you follow a similarpath as you've taken before

(15:19):
or do you have advice for peoplewho are just starting out?
- I tell them that justfollow your passion
because these days, youcan excel in anything.
The world is different from my days.
There are people who I wantto become only a doctor,
nothing else.
But then on the other hand, youdon't know your own talents.
Your own talents may be inpainting, you are fascinated,
so give it a chance.

(15:41):
- It seems that you'vebenefited in your life
from mentors and teachers
who gave you that kind of encouragement,
who gave you the leeway to explore.
- Exactly, I should, veryimportant to mention two teachers.
When I was studying my 10th standard,
I was regularly failingin my mathematics exam
and I used to be a good student,
I was not a naughty student,
there were 52 studentsin the class, 52, 55,

(16:03):
so it was a big class.
So I was always sitting inthe front and very attentive.
He said that, "You seem to be attentive,
why are you failing at math?"
"Sir, I understandwhatever you are saying.
I revised the subjectone day before the exam.
I go and sit in the exam hall,
I'm not able to answer any question."
He said, "Do you do homeworkand work out problems?"
I said, "No sir, I help my mother."

(16:23):
He said, "You should workout mathematical problems.
Mathematics comes only by working out."
So he taught me how to dohomework and work on problems
because we had nothing like a homework,
there is no compulsion.
So he taught me how torecord the problems.
So from that period onwards,
I started getting better marks, past mark.
- He taught you how toreason through the problems,

(16:44):
how to figure them out yourself
or was it that you were not understanding
how he was teaching them or you weren't
ingesting it?- No, no, no,
I was understanding
but I simply had no time to do my homework
'cause once I go home I started playing
'cause I am from hardworkingparents, nine children
and I had many, many friends.
We used to play and therewas a public park nearby,

(17:05):
there's a gym,
I used to be a streetgymnast kind of thing,
you know, do all kinds of things there.
My parents were happy as long
as I am not naughty and I'm not rowdy.
So there was no insistence onsitting at home and studying.
Like in my one family, whenI completed eighth grade,
that's an interesting point,
in which if you arestudying, you can study.

(17:25):
Otherwise, you go for a job.
So many of my relatives cameand wanted to take me away for,
to become their apprentice in a shop.
And my mom and dad, theywere very enlightened.
My dad was a very hard workerand he has not studied,
he has studied until second grade.
He was a socialist, you know,
he believed in socialism

(17:45):
and money should be spent for everybody.
Also, he realized theimportance of education.
So he said,
since I'm studying withoutfailing my annual exam,
he said, "Let him continue."
My mom also, she hadcompleted eighth grade,
which is a big step in her days.
She said, "This boy should continue."
So none of my brotherswent beyond high school.

(18:06):
And the thanks to greatpolitician by the name Kamaraj,
he had just introduced freeeducation for poor children.
Otherwise, it would have been impossible
for them to pay my fees.
- So your education was government?
- Government, exactly until my,
nominal, half a dollar
or even much less in Indian, two Rupees
That's why I was able to study
and I was not a problematic child.

(18:27):
I was good at hands, Ican make things, break it.
So I wanted to become an engineer.
But when I finished myschool and enter college,
you need some mark, some minimum mark.
I did not have a minimum mark
so I could not become an engineer.
My friend said take chemistryor zoology or this and that.
I had no clear idea.
Then one day I was goingto the principal's office
with the application form

(18:48):
in which I had left the groupwithout mentioning what it is.
So my friend came outof principal's office.
I asked him, "Christian,what subject are you taking?"
He said, "Physics."
I put physics.
That was my how I entered into physics.
- That's pretty amazing
from a family where most peopledon't go past eighth grade
to you eventually earninga PhD and then working
as a physicist your whole life.

(19:11):
It's a different path that Iassume most of your friends-
- Oh yeah, yeah, totally different path,
and at every stage I cansay somebody lifted me up
and put me up, that's something.
Then, as I tell, in 10thstandard, my maths teacher,
and 11th standard, my English teacher.
I was also failing in English.
My English teacher,Reverend Father, KSR Antham

(19:31):
he was a great man, but hewas a terror to the students,
he was very strict guy.
One day, he was reading the marks
and I got 32 marks in English.
35 is the pass mark out of hundred.
So he asked me, "Why are you failing?"
I said, "Father, I can't memorize things."
He said, "No, no, you should not memorize,
you should understand."
So he told me how to understand.
He asked me to buy a dictionary
and draw line under a wordthat you don't understand

(19:54):
and then write the meaning in Tamil.
Then he said, "Read eachlesson 10 times slowly
and something will sink into your mind
and go and write whatevercomes out of your mind,
you'll pass."
And then I started passing the exam.
So that was a very important step for me.
- And then at some point I guess
you had to even further specialize
into strongly correlated electron systems.

(20:16):
How did that choice happen?
- My professor, N. Kumar,
he used to go to ICTP, InternationalCenter for Theoretical Physics,
every time he'll come backand tell what is exciting.
So he gave a set of lectures
on strongly correlated electron system
and modern developments in the field.
- Just to stop,
ICTP, that's in Trieste, Italy,
that's the InternationalCenter for Theoretical Physics?

(20:37):
- My professor was aregular visitor there.
He was an young professor
and then he also started working on some,
we had an outstandingvisitor from Bell Labs
by name Jay Ramen and hegave some series of lectures
on some outstanding phenomena
and strongly correlatedsystem and heavy fermions.
So I was exposed to that.
That was not part of my PhD thesis.

(20:59):
And it became very clear,
strongly correlatedelectron systems are very,
offer many challenges.
Again, I have to tell,it's very important.
I was fortunate to meetprofessor at Bangalore
by name S.K. Rangarajan.
He was a phenomena himself.
He was only an undergraduate,
he became a seniorprofessor, he had no PhD,
because of his talent.

(21:20):
So he found us students
with Department of Theoretical Physics.
So he collected us one day.
"You are all very motivated and so on,
but the way that you aredoing theoretical physics
is not correct.
So you should have group discussion.
So he just collected ustogether and put us together
and he would invite us to his house,
which is not far from the institute,
so we'll go at eight o'clockand sit for two, three hours.

(21:42):
And he said the ideais not to read papers.
He made it very clear.
The idea is to go deepinto classic papers.
And one of the classic paperswas by Philip W. Anderson,
the great Nobel Laureate
So I was introduced to Anderson's paper
in Rangarajan's house
through discussion.
So that's how I was exposed
to this quantum many-bodysystems and so on.
P.W. Anderson became my hero.

(22:04):
It was very clear he's outstanding
the way that he wasdoing things and so on.
So it's in that background Igrew up and wrote a thesis.
- And he eventuallybecame not just your hero
but your longtimecollaborator, is that right?
- Yeah, that was thanks to ICTP.
So I submitted my thesis.
The Institute of Mathematical Sciences
wanted to give me a job,
but they could not becauseI had no publications.

(22:24):
So they gave me a nice fellowship.
I got married already.
So then I saw this advertisementby Winter College at ICTP
so I applied for it.
A friend of mine helped meto get travel fellowship
and I went there.
So there, it was again in a place,
an eclectic place, Ilistened to all talks.
My mentors there liked it
because many people came downthere to just write papers.

(22:46):
I never wrote any papers.
I was interacting with people,
so they were very happy with me,
they made me an associate and so on.
So I was going there everyyear since '76 for three months
participating actively.
And in fact they were so nice,
in the second year they asked me
to be responsible for a conference.
They asked me to collect thebest people in that field
and organize a conference, which I did,

(23:08):
and it allowed me to interact,I met many great people.
- You mentioned that a friendarranged a travel fellowship.
Would you have been able to go,
had that travel reimbursementnot been possible?
- No, it would not have been possible
because it's a huge amount
in Indian's salary and my background.
See this friend's nameis Subbiah Arunachalam.
He's a champion of open access.

(23:29):
He's 80 plus, he's stillvery active in India.
So this guy and me met,
we were together atIndian Science Bangalore.
He was four years seniorto me, four or five years.
But still, he came for a PhDmuch later so we were friends.
So I wrote to to him saying
that I am applying for a travel fellowship
and you know there are bureaucracy
and there are ways theremay be delay and so on.

(23:51):
He immediately took my application
and went around the offices in Delhi
and said that this boy should be supported
'cause he is very serious.
So that's how I got my travel fellowship.
Arunachalam is that.
He's a kind of angel, youknow, he helps everybody.
Whenever he gets achance, he'll get people.
He's a very selfless person.
- So I think what we'retalking about right now

(24:12):
relates a little bit tothe talk that you gave here
at Perimeter Institute on Friday.
Could you tell us a little bit
about the subject of this talk you gave?
- It was Abdus Salam
and the International Centerfor Theoretical Physics,
Abdus Salam at ICTP.
Abdus Salam, as many of you know,
is a very famous Nobel Laureate.
He got his Nobel Prize along with Glashow

(24:33):
for standard model, grand unification
of strong, weak andelectromagnetic interaction.
In addition to being agreat theoretical physicist,
he was a remarkable human being
who was passionate aboutwellbeing of common people
all over the world.
So in particular, hesaid that poor countries
should make use of sciencein their development

(24:53):
'cause science and technology
has been helping humanityenormously over the years.
So we should not lose that talent,
we should nurture it inevery developing countries.
So he himself was an example,
you know, he did a goodtheoretical physics PhD
at Cambridge, Princeton andhe went back, was isolated.
So he wanted to move that isolation.
So one way is to build aninstitute, international center,

(25:14):
where isolated peopleare brought together,
get their batteries chargedand then go back and perform.
So that man started ICTP
and I was fortunate thatI went there in 1976.
I spent nearly three months every year
for the next 20, 30 years.
I became an associate, Ibecame a staff associate,
then I ran some collegesthere, spring colleges
and I also ran about12 successful workshops

(25:36):
because there is a very goodinfrastructure, good help
and you could do all these things.
It started with theoreticalphysics, which is,
you know, an importantcomponent of modern science.
There are many capable peoplein third world countries,
but because of isolation,they are not able to catch up,
so bring them together.
So it was doing the service extremely well
and then I grew up there.

(25:58):
So I met Professor Salam several times.
I have seen him in action
and his passion for people and science.
So that's why I gave a talk.
And it definitely helped my career.
A I said in my talk, I met myhero, P.W. Anderson at ICTP,
accidentally I should say,
because he gave a beautifultalk and I thought that's it.

(26:18):
Then my host Irir Torsati cameand dragged me and he said,
"Anderson is free, pleasego and talk to him."
I was reluctant to talk to him.
He was too big for me.
- You were intimidated?
- No, he was a nice man.
He is a Nobel Laureate already
and he has produced Nobel Prizes.
So I was kind of feelingreluctant to meet him.
Then I was forced to meet him.
then that's how it began.
So bringing people togetheris one of the important jobs

(26:41):
spontaneously meeting comes naturally.
So I was fortunate that I was in ICTP.
Then I went to Princeton for three years.
Again, it's a very interesting thing.
In November '84, thefirst year I was there,
there was a beautifultalk by John Hopfield,
the father of neural network.
John was a good friend of Phil Anderson.

(27:01):
Since I was already interestedin biology from a distance,
so I was fascinated by the talk,
and in a moment of weakness,
I thought I haveunderstood what is a brain,
it was one of those illusions
because John gave such a beautiful talk
about brain and Hebb's Ruleand connections, pruning
and then basal attraction
and things that I couldunderstand, relate to.
So it was fascinating.

(27:22):
Then I decided, next momentI would work on neurobiology.
So at Princeton.
And when I told this to PhilAnderson, he encouraged me.
He said, "It's a fantasticdecision, please go."
So he said, "Don't worryabout doing metaphysics.
You are here, we are happy,do whatever you like."
So I spent two yearslearning neurobiology,
and it's a very tough subject.
I even participated in theconference at Santa Barbara.

(27:45):
The date was neurobiology forphysicists, it was a workshop.
And the workshop was really special.
Only neuroscientists spoke.
Even John Hopkins was in the audience.
But the point is neurobiologists
would make fun of physicists.
They say, these physicists comeand in one day make a model
and get away with it.
Neuroscience is really complicated.
So they will tellclinical facts, this fact.

(28:06):
So it was a good dialogue
between two differentcommunities with different views
because we think somesimplified model for them.
Simplified models are useless
'cause for practical clinicians and so on.
Whereas for generalunderstanding, it's important.
I was spending two years veryseriously thinking about that.
Then high temperature, superconnected to revolution broke.

(28:26):
Then it shifted mydirection and I gave up,
I started working withAnderson on those problems.
So those three years at Princeton
was memorable in many, many respects,
met great people, startedthinking about great problems.
- I remember in your talk on Friday,
you said that that initialtrip to ICTP in 1976,
because you had a travel fellowship,

(28:48):
that that launched yourcareer essentially.
And it sounds like the place,
ICTP is designed to help launch careers
for those who may not beable to launch them otherwise
because of where they're fromor how much money they have.
- Yeah, I know a lot ofstudents attended your talk
and postdocs and researchersand also administrative staff.
It was accessible to everyone,
and we had a few questionssent in as follow-up.

(29:11):
So maybe let's first playthe question from Anna Kanur.
She's a PSI student here.
- Okay.
- In a recent talk at Perimeter,
you stated that in building up
the International Centerfor Theoretical Physics,
Professor Abdus Salamhad a profound impact
in making scientific exchangeand education more accessible.

(29:32):
But you also said that he woulddo things differently today.
So how would you envision
a truly impactful scientific institution
in the early 21st century?
- Having said that very quickly,
I don't know how I will doit, but let me tell you,
when Salam started, it was early '60's.

(29:52):
It's nearly 60 years ago.
The world was connected
by electromagnetic radiationand wireless communications
but it's very different now.
So let me give you one specific example
that I recently gave a talk.
Salam will start, for example,
encouraging privatedonors to contribute money
and use lots of programswhich are connected by

(30:14):
suppose I had no opportunityto come from Bangalore to ICTP.
I had no travel fellowship.
I could have still benefited by Zoom talks
because some of the Zoomtalks are very inspiring,
I could even talk, so that kindof things would've happened.
It is in this context I was telling you
about the experience of Einstein
and how it could be used inmodern times to propagate signs

(30:35):
and get people from third world countries
to get deeply involved in science.
So the first part of my answer is
people are not able to go toICTP or come to Perimeter,
there can be Zoom talks.
With (indistinct), I had a discussion
and we tried very hardto implement it in India.
It was called PSA mirror at Chennai.
The idea is to employ ourown post docs as tutors

(30:58):
and run the video lectures from here
and get about 30 students from Chennai,
just finished theirmaster's, motivated students,
and give them the sameassignments, so it's mirroring it.
The office was very enthusiastic and so on
and then finally therewas some budget crunch
and then it fell down.
Because of internet connections
and because of thisnew fantastic facility,

(31:18):
Salam will do it differently,that's what I mean.
The personal presencewill be definitely good,
but then in case you cannot do it,
what is the next best?
Then in that context, Ialso wanted to tell you
Neil Turok has this fantastic
African Institute of Mathematical Sciences
and that they started something
called Next Einstein from Africa.
So I gave a talk in India,

(31:40):
Next Einstein from Developing Countries.
This was inspiration thatcame from Einstein himself.
Einstein, when he joined ETHat the Hague in Switzerland
as five year course student
from day number one,
he collected about 10,12 like-minded students
and started discussingphysics, philosophy,
religion, everything everyday for three hours intensely.

(32:01):
Sometimes they came across abook by a famous mathematician
Henri Poincare, great mathematician.
The title of the book is"Science and Hypothesis".
In fact, I have a copy of that book.
Poincare was a generalist.
He knew a lot of science.
So he eliminated
what are the unsolvedproblems in science now.
So three of the strikingproblems that he put
was in Brownian motion,photoelectric effect,

(32:21):
and is there ether?
So these young minds starteddiscussing that problem
fearlessly without any inhibition
and slowly dug deepand equipped themselves
with enough mathematics and phenomenology.
Because there are 10 people,everybody is strong in one way
so they complimented each other.
In three years,
apparently teachersstarted envying the group
because these boys and girlsknew more than the teachers.

(32:45):
Then in five years, theyeven started writing papers.
Minkowski was one of the thingsand Melegos was also there.
For some reasons,
Einstein did not geta research fellowship.
He became a patent of his clerk
thanks to one of the fathers of this group
and then he continuedin the name academia.
They would meet in theevenings and discuss.
And then in few years,they wrote the famous 1905
paper on Brownian motion,relativity theory and so on.

(33:08):
So what I said was, now Iwill go to a remote village,
it could be in Africaor it could be in India,
nothing is remote for the satellite.
Suppose you give everybody a cheap tablet.
So let them sit and goto internet, all courses,
MIT, Harvard courses are available,
start with the element,Perimeter courses are available,
and sit together every day for two hours,

(33:30):
whatever Einstein had,whatever facilities they had,
it's there in the library, sothey can go deeply into it.
and if such things are initiatedand if they're encouraged,
there'll be many more Einstein'sfrom all over the world.
That was my point.
In fact, my professor,Rangarajan in Bangalore,
he was inspired by Einstein.
That way, he saidtheoretical should be done

(33:51):
through group discussion.
Everybody has a strengthand you can share it.
So I wanted to say thatabout this Anna's question.
Thanks to modern technology,
there is no isolation in some sense.
Like minded people can work together
cause nothing like groupdiscussion among peers
because then you haveno inhibition, no fear,
you can ask stupid questions,no question is stupid.

(34:12):
- That notion that the next Einstein
could come from anywhere in the world
is really helped by the ideathat now at relatively low cost
people can do what you couldn't do.
And so it opens up doors to more people.
- Thanks to arrangingthese Abdus Salam lectures,
I started going back to my lecture
on Next Einstein fromDeveloping Countries.

(34:32):
This article appeared somewhere.
I want to rewrite it and putit more accessible to people
because people can think about it.
This a new power because it'salso good for young minds
because young children are,
you know, they don't knowwhat to do these days.
They're isolated,
but they can be united alsothrough this group discussion
and they can make useful things.
- I think this is such an important point

(34:53):
that technology can enableus to include more people
in these discussions.
And I think this leads in really well
to another question that was sent in.
This one is from Estelle Inac,she's a research scientist.
- Yeah, Estelle, yes.
- And we've interviewed herfor our podcast as well.
- Oh, wonderful.
- Hello, Baskaran.
Thank you very much forthe time that you took
to talk with me

(35:14):
and for the very nice seminarthat you gave on Friday.
So I have two questions for you today
and my first question is the following,
In your opinion, whyare developing countries
still lagging as far as progress
in cutting edge theoreticalphysics is concerned?
And the second question is,
what should be done to closethe gap of research excellence

(35:37):
with the developed world?
Thank you very much.
- We take a developing country,
they have many, many problems,
starting from bad politiciansto water, poverty,
disease and so on sothey have to prioritize.
Politicians always find it convenient
to prioritize somethingelse rather than education.
So we have to slowly convince them.

(35:57):
I think it's a question of perception
because the kind ofvision that Perimeter has,
that theoretical physicseventually helps technology,
it's not obvious to people in development.
They say, "No, no, we have aproblem, we want a solution.
We can't be waiting for 100 years"
which may be relevant.
So people like Estelle,
you should go andconvince your government,
educate them, it'll take time.

(36:19):
For example, in my own country,
soon after independence,
it was realized by theleaders in those days
that science and technologyis very important.
So unlike many parallelneighboring countries,
we had some men lateand if I tell the name,
I don't want to be belongto any particular politics,
you know, this leader bynamed Jawaharlal Nehru,
he worked with MahatmaGandhi for liberation now

(36:39):
in India and so on, he envisionedthat science is important,
science and technology.
So from the beginning, heput money and good people,
so we are reaping that benefit now.
it has not happened inmany other countries.
It is a question ofconvincing people over time.
And also in India,
many of my colleagues complain,
they are very bitterabout what is happening
in politics and so on.

(37:00):
I tell them that Indiais an end democracy.
We are 1.5 billion people.
We got freedom only 60 years ago.
100 years from now will be much better.
Then they get angry.
But I'm just saying that,you know, things take time,
there's a time scale for everything.
So we should be patientbut constantly trying.
- It seems like timethough for richer nations

(37:22):
is a luxury that they have
because they can afford toaddress immediate problems,
medium term problems.
It seems in the developingworld, like you said,
the instinct would be let'sfix the immediate problems
right in front of us.
So how do you convincepoliticians to look maybe 10, 50,
100 years into the future,
which is the timeframe of some

(37:44):
fundamental science.- So for example,
what I will do is thereis a very famous book
by former director
of Institute for AdvancedStudies at Princeton.
The title of the book is"Usefulness of Useless Science".
He hired Einstein and so on.
So we have to translate suchbooks into regional languages.
But to me, more urgent thing is
to start group activityamong enthusiastic children

(38:06):
and the scientists,
because Abdus Salam
return from Princeton and went to his town
and he was isolated.
Now if Abdus Salam goes,
there is no reason whyhe should be isolated.
He can have Zoom meetingevery day, two Zoom meeting,
which is happening now.
Then, politicians appreciate it.
Internet should be used ina much more creative way,

(38:27):
bringing people together.
- It seems like a lotof the challenges about,
you know, bringing people together
who maybe have different experiences,
and it actually kind of reminds me
of something you said in your paper
when you were describingcondensed matter physicists
collaborating with biologists.
And so in your paper that was called
"Condensed matter, PhysicsBiology Resonance",

(38:48):
I wrote down somethingyou wrote which was that,
"the urgent problem facinga hardcore biologist
is often very different
from what a physicistgenuinely interested in biology
is capable of solvingin a short time period."
And so I think here too,
you maybe have the challenge
that these two types ofscientists are approaching things
from a different setup or adifferent way of thinking.

(39:09):
So can you maybe talkabout that challenge there?
- Yeah, very good.
I will give you anexample of Stan Liebler.
So he was a condensed matter theorist,
statist school mechanicin Chicago or somewhere.
He slowly got into biology.
Now he's at the Institutefor Advanced Studies
a professor of biology.
He used to do wet biology.
So yeah biologist, supposeyou go and tell him

(39:32):
that this model is important, he will not,
because he's working very, very hard,
one Nobel Laureate fromStanford, I forget his name,
he spent his whole lifeseparating out one enzyme,
one particular enzyme and got Nobel Prize,
but he's not interested inthe whole quantum biology
or you know, holistic things.
So there are people whohave their own compulsions.
So you like to tell them thatthese things are important,

(39:53):
you know like in nature,there are a variety of things,
there is desert, there is Mount Everest,
there is this and that.
Imagine a world without ocean,
imagine a world withoutdesert, so it's important.
In that sense, yeah theoretical biology,
in the long run, it will definitely,
but it has to be convinced,
and it's happening in many places.
Because I remember, oncethere was a colloquium
at the Institute for Advanced Studies.

(40:14):
Frank Wilczek had invited
some very distinguished biologistsfrom MIT to give a talk.
So he just, you know, madefun of theoretical physicists.
He said, "That you guyscome into few talks
and you come with a model.
What I'm going through today
is a hypothesis which I made 20 years ago
and it has taken 20 years forme to prove that hypothesis."
But on the other hand,what he says is true,
but then there are also peoplewho have to see the forest

(40:37):
from a distance and youknow, it's very important.
And it's happening.
Compared to 50 years ago,
now biology, physicsinteraction is amazing.
- When we first chatted a week or so ago,
I was so fascinated aboutthe conversation we had
about quantum biology,
partly 'cause it's an area Ihaven't learned much about,
but also because it's thekind of thing that we can

(40:57):
in a sense relate to becausewe are biological entities.
So you know, we talked about
how there may be quantumprocesses in bird migration
or in how bacteria use themagnetic field of the world.
Can you speak a little bit about
how biology and theoreticalphysics are coming together
in your own work?

(41:18):
- Okay, see I should confessthat I'm not an expert.
On my webpage in theinstitute, I don't find this,
I had a sentence aboutmyself interested in biology.
It said, "Love at a distance
and I am longing for a residence with her
in the last 40 years."
- Unrequited love?
- Exactly, well yeah, that's kind of.
So two years I spent thinkingof going into neurobiology

(41:40):
but that was too short, then I came back.
Since then, suppose somebodygives me a paper on "Nature"
or "Science" magazine,
I don't go to physicssection, I go to biology
to you see what is goingon, just to get an idea.
And also, I gave a fullfledged course on biology
from a very good book at myinstitute many years ago.
Just no equation, just phenomena

(42:00):
because physicists are not used to it.
- It was biology forphysicists, this course?
- Yeah, biology for physicists,
it was a six months full fledged course.
Bruce Alberts is a very famous biologist.
He got Nobel Prize and so on.
He has a book called"Essential Cell Biology",
very nice book, very descriptive,
so I covered the entirebook for my course.
So I have been enjoyingit from a distance.

(42:22):
So I have not contributed anyeven epsilon to real progress.
In fact, once I had a post-docwho started working with me
on some issues in photosynthesis,quantum equivalence,
then he left, but Iseriously think about it.
- It's more of a passionthan your line of?
- Two examples that you gave.
In fact, it's almostconfirmed in bionavigation,

(42:42):
the theory due to Klaus Schultenis correct in the sense.
So the challenges of falling,
that is birds seem to find thedirection of magnetic field
in their migration.
But magnetic field is very weak, one goes.
So if you convert it intosome energy scale in terms of,
it's one kelvin.
So we are at 300 kelvins,how do you do this?

(43:03):
So Klaus Schulten thought,
it's called radical pair hypothesis.
There are some chemical reactions
in which a radical has an unpaired spin.
So there is a biradical, two radicals.
So the two spins are weekly coupled
and they can form a spinsinglet or a spin triplet.
Spin triplet is an entangled state.
A spinning triplet letsup, is a product state.

(43:23):
Now depending on the spin state,
the reaction pathwaycan be very different,
they can bifurcate.
Klaus Schulten's point was
this entanglement issensed by a nuclear spin
and then it remembers that.
I cannot explain it in a very short time.
So there is very importantrole played by nuclear spin,
which is well isolatedfrom the environment

(43:44):
because of the weak couplingwith the rest of the world
through hyper fan coupling.
I heard a talk in factsome years ago at Berkeley,
Klaus Schulten was sitting next to me,
somebody confirming his hypothesis.
It's getting more and more favorable
from an experimental point of view.
So in that sense, nuclearspins are very important.
Every water molecule has two protons

(44:06):
and even if you forget thespin of oxygen nucleus,
proton spins are, they are like qubit,
what are they doing?
Some people have speculated wildly
so people shy away from it.
But recently, MatthewFisher, one of our deviants,
has come up with a very concrete idea
using some molecule wherethis entangled nuclear spin,
even when they are separated,

(44:27):
they may remain entangled
because of weak coupling andit can trigger something,
we do not know.
So this is a kind of new friend,
but people are careful for good reasons.
People start speculatingwithout doing calculations.
They similar is very seriously
and they say we understandeverything, which is wrong.
So it is in this field,
I can see in my last30, 40 years experience,

(44:48):
it's the experiment which is pushy.
Like bird navigation,
now experiments are confirming
the hypothesis that Klaus Schulten made.
- These processes are actually part
of bird migration?- Exactly, they've done
create experiments with cageand changing magnetic field,
found the correlations.
It's amazing.
It's respected by serious people
and that they're doingmore and more experiments.
- From my perspective,

(45:08):
I've always thought thatquantum processes happen
in a very, very small, veryisolated, non-biological system
that we biological animals areall wet and meaty and large
and all the things that makequantum processes not happen.
- In fact what you are saying is,
or often people say,
quantum mechanic startsat the level of bonding,

(45:29):
then the rest is chemistry,rest are reaction rates,
which was true.
But however, thanks to experiments,
we see surprises, like photosynthesis.
In photosynthesis, photongets absorbed by a molecule
and it gets excited, it's called exciton.
This exciton people thoughthops from place to place
and then delivers its energy at the place
which delivers an electron,

(45:50):
so it starts an electrontransfer reaction.
But there was a surprise
from Toronto schools and other people
that the exciton remains quantum coherent
over time scale than we suspected.
Nature smile at peoplethat something else happen.
Now there are many theories toconvince that it is possible
because after all, biologyis a regulated system,
we pump energy, could pumpenergy to keep a place cool.

(46:12):
You know, in fact, in thecolloquium that we had last week.
- Was it Nicole?
- Yeah, exactly, Nicole.
I asked her a question becauseshe said her quantum battery,
there are applications to photosynthesis.
I asked her and she sent me a pre-print.
It's fascinating becausethey are implicating
kind of physics that they have found out
at the level of single photondetection in our vision.

(46:36):
Because it's well known thatvision begins like yeah,
at the level of detecting a single photon,
basically it's a long molecule,
it's confirmation changes fromcis to trans or trans to cis.
Now apparently for that tohappen in a regulated way,
you need some of these ideas.
So it's a beginning,
nobody suspected it before.

(46:57):
So there's a whole lot of things,
again, thanks to experiments.
Without experiments, we cannotmake any of these things
'cause it'll become very wild
because people say
that our consciousnessis quantum mechanical.
Maybe, but who can prove it?
But this photosynthesis,
I was also telling youthe case of only faction.
In fact I heard a talk inthe same Berkeley meeting
by Luca Turin.

(47:17):
So apparently in the theory ofsmell or in the experiments,
a specific molecule correspondsto a specific smell.
So it goes and fits like alock and key into some enzyme.
Then there is a chemical reaction
or a electron transfer reaction.
And it was experimentally found,
apparently when the molecule fits,
there is no such smellingif the molecule is replaced

(47:39):
by its isotope,
for example, if you replaceall the hydrogen atom
'cause the mass is different.
then look at it in speculated,
that somehow the electron transfer
is phonon assisted tunneling.
The phonon quantile from the molecule
is delivered to the electron with jumps,
but it is not the right quanta.
So it's a lesson intunneling, so smelling stuff.

(47:59):
and I was very happy to hear
that that's also getting confirmed.
So there are many, manysmall, small processes,
there are many such things,you know, who knows?
- So there was one that youmentioned actually in a paper
that just, I was so fascinated by.
In one of the papers that you sent us,
the last paragraphstarts with the sentence,
"Nature is remarkable."
And then you give theexample of a snapping shrimp,

(48:22):
that it snaps its claw,which creates a sound,
but then the sound, the bubble collapse
and it actually creates light.
And I, first of all, that's amazing to me,
I didn't know thatshrimp could create light
by snapping its claw,
but this is another exampleof nature has been at this
for billions of years
and we're sort of trying tocatch up with our experiments.

(48:43):
- See, I was writing that article
and my professor on his 60th birthday.
I made the thesis that all(indistinct) in biology.
Then as I was finishing that paper,
I came across this paper in "Nature"
where sonoluminescene is been made use of
by biological creatures in the deep ocean.

(49:04):
And sonoluminesceneaccording to this researcher
was discovered 150years ago by some people
but nature had it.
- Yeah, nature's beendoing some of this stuff
well before we even wereon the scene to examine it.
- Radical pairing,
similar to splittingand quantum coherence,
nature has evolved and,
in fact, there are serious people

(49:24):
working on quantum biology,
and of course, it's very tough field
because experiments are very few,
so you have to collaboratewith the experiment at least.
Like one mathematician, Roger Penrose,
he has a hypothesis ofmicrotubules acting like qubits.
So microtubules are collection of proteins
which forms tubes,
they are like skeletonsof the inside the cell.

(49:47):
They carry dipole moment.
So his hypothesis is that this could,
act electromagnetic modeof that could like qubit.
And there are group of peoplewho are trying to prove it.
So many people say it's not possible,
but there's an active discussion.
So there are some latent speculations
and there are some wild speculations.
That's why people shyaway from this field.
It's not hard field withexperimental evidences,

(50:10):
someone can easily go astray.
- And some people do go astray.
You know, some of these ideas,
people start to thinkof the brain and quantum
and then pseudosciencesometimes takes over.
- Exactly, pseudoscience,that's the right word, yeah.
I think it's okay for the public,
but scientists should not get that,
and also the public can get swayed,
because they may startemphasizing the wrong things.
I do an experiment, youshould be able to repeat it.

(50:33):
- I think it's difficultbecause this area,
combining two fields, you know,quantum physics and biology,
you've said there's a lot ofproblems at that intersection
that are worth studying.
But then some, like consciousness,that at least for now
are maybe too complicated tostudy at that intersection.
Do you think there are some problems
that will always be toocomplicated to study?

(50:55):
- Ah, that's a very good question.
So your question is, willhumanity ever understand mind?
I suspect, yes.
You know, the universe is too complex
and too big to be comprehended.
Think about just eight billion people,
each person is own universe,his own mind, his one richness,
that's one tiny dot, right?

(51:15):
And also our own, youknow, this is bacteria.
The number of bacteria in our body
is about five times thenumber of cells in the body.
This came as a shock whenI heard it 10 years ago
during an interview.
Then I started reading about it.
It's amazing how weare helped by bacteria.
So there is too much to be comprehended.
Even in condensed meta physics,
we thought we understandsalt, sodium chloride,

(51:36):
now we don't understand this.
Slowly, progress is taking place.
Nature is inexhaustible andwe have finite lifetime,
we live for 100 years.
These days some people saythat from 10 years, onwards.
No, everybody will live for 100 years
'cause quality of life ischanging, medicine and so on.
So, but you know, theuniverse is 13 billion years.
It's already a miracle thatwe are able to comprehend.
As Einstein said, he can't comprehend

(51:58):
that we can comprehendlittle bit of the world.
- Well it sounds likeyou have just as many,
if not more questions in your head now
than you did when you were starting out
- Definitely, exactly, exactly.
- So a lifetime of science,
but now you're left with more
questions than you started with?
- Definitely.
- Is that part of the joy of it?

(52:19):
- So you understand a little bit of it,
then you don't understandmore and excitement continues.
It's also question of training oneself.
You know, I have the habit
of spending half an hour everyday looking at the archive.
I tell young people to do that.
- Oh, that's the pre-print site
for all the new physics papers?
- So I can't do all ofthem, I am very choosy,
strongly correlated systems
and super connectivityand quantum physics,

(52:40):
I download few papers.
It's exciting to see howdevelopments are taking place.
It provokes your thought,you start thinking about,
and some of it, all thecrazy ideas are at work,
so you feel happy about it, satisfied.
You didn't write that paper, it's okay.
- Yeah, you know one thingthat really stood out to me
from our earlier discussion,
you said that you have a lotof folders on your computer
that contain unfinished projectsand I think that's great,

(53:04):
you know that your interests are so broad
and there's so many questions
and sometimes you don'tend up answering them,
of course, sometimes you do.
I'm just curious if thereare some of those projects
that you look back on
and find yourself still wondering about
that you might go back to someday.
- Yeah, yeah, it very often happens.
You think of something,
you start writing a pre-printand you leave it there.
You haven't forgottenthe name of the paper.

(53:27):
In fact, it's a goodpoint I should mention
because it's like a public promise.
See, great Einstein wrote a paper in 1920
before quantum mechanics was born,
a theory of super conductivity.
Not many people know about it
and a good person fromGermany translated it
and so Einstein's paper is in the archive.
When I read that paper, I was shocked
because Einstein was so ahead of time.

(53:48):
He says, okay, so here is aphenomena, zero resistance.
I know what is Drude's law,
there are electrons which are starting,
they have some lifetime.
And then he says totallyaway from any Drude's law
it's something totally different.
So he comes to the conclusion
that our normal metal is a puzzle,
it should be thought of asa perturbed superconductor.

(54:10):
So he completely reverses.
He says, "You shouldunderstand normal metal."
And that is what the gamein superconductivity is.
Then normal metal is very unusual
it's called anomalous normal.
And then on top of that,what he could think of
with available resources and knowledge.
So he says, okay, hereis a phenomena that I see
(indistinct)
so how could it be?

(54:31):
So he thinks of an electron
hopping from one site to another site.
Then there'll be strong, cool repulsion.
Next electron will not allow you to come.
So it will push the other electron,
it will push it so they'll form a cycle.
So you call it as a cyclicexchange, I forget the name.
So he says, under someconditions, the electron's motion
will not be independent, butit will be cyclic motion,
and maybe that is under that.

(54:52):
In fact, it's very true.
In fact, the whole quantum hall effect
and many of these things arerelated to phenomena like that.
So Einstein thought about it.
In fact, in the context of quantum hall,
this is something ring exchange theory
due to Schafer and company.
So this collective cooperating
motion of electrons in the form of rings
is according to Einstein at theheart of super conductivity.
In fact, it is related to later

(55:14):
something called permutation cycles
that happens in both systems.
So I had written an article
connecting Einstein's oldtheory with modern theory,
and I just saw it yesterday.
I felt like kickingmyself, it's 10 years ago,
I didn't do anything.
So to answer your question-
- So you saw it on yourcomputer, not published,
it's an unfinished?
- Exactly, it's a tech file.

(55:35):
I started it and just halfway.
- Well, maybe over time
if you leave a paper fora year or five years,
does your brain,
you know, the things thatyou've learned over that time,
you can approach the subjectafter a break from it
with a different perspective?
- That's right.
Sometimes, you know, Ifind that I was wrong,
but sometimes I find I'mmore right, it happens.

(55:56):
- Well, it seems toofrom what I understand,
that going to talks and alsohaving discussions with people
is such an important partof your research for you.
you mentioned going toNicole Younger Halpern's talk
and it gave you some idea
that's maybe related to some other things
you have been thinking about.
And so I guess maybe that'salso something that can happen,
you attend to talk andthat gives you an idea
for one of those unfinished projects.

(56:19):
- That's right.
So for some reason I wassearching for something,
then I landed on my paper andit made me sad for a while,
but then I said, okay, it's fine.
- We've been talking a lot
about how your interests are so broad,
but I've been wondering if there's,
is there an idea thatmaybe ties them together?
And maybe I'm wrong, butI wonder if the idea-
- Is there an identifying theme?

(56:39):
- Yeah, that maybe understanding emergence
is somehow some kind oftheme in all this work.
Would you say that that's something
that's tying all of this together?
- Yeah, I think partly influencedby PW Anderson's career
and his works and so on.
Emergence fascinates me.
In biology, emergence is very obvious
because you have atoms,molecules, water molecules,

(57:00):
and then many things happen,
there are insects ofmillions and billions types.
So we say that over billionsof years, these things happen.
You could not have predictednext level what will happen
by knowing what you know now.
There is a famous evolutionary biologist
by the name Ernst Meyer.
He and Neils Bohr discuss emergence.
Apparently Ernst Meyer was bragging

(57:22):
about emergence in biology.
Neils Bohr said, "The wholephysics is emergence."
He said, "Hydrogen atom."
Then he suppose, you knowhydrogen atom very well.
So put hydrogen atomstogether, two of them,
it becomes hydrogenmolecule, tightly bound.
Then put a water, oxygenthan it become H2O.
Then put few water molecules together,
there is tendency to form hydrogen bound
and quantum tunneling.

(57:43):
Then put more together,you get water droplet.
Then you freeze them,you get 12 phases of ice.
Then you flow, let the waterflow, then you get turbulence,
which is one of the mostdifficult mathematical problems.
So you have clouds and all kinds of things
emerges from oxygen and waterin various associations.
So he views physics as full of emergence.

(58:03):
While people appreciate it,
it was not part of the conscience
of condensed matter community.
It is here Anderson wrote a paper in 1972,
more is different.
Actually, it was a response
to some of the attitudes of colleagues
saying that including great men,
supposed to have said that no,
now you have the right equation,
the rest is chemistry.
You don't need to understand anything.
You know, science is done.

(58:24):
Some great person, the end of science,
you know, the rest is a matter of detail.
And Anderson took that asa challenge and he said,
"No, that is not true.
Nothing ends, new thingscontinue to emerge."
He caught onto this notionof symmetry breaking
because you can organize manythings in condensed matter,
you can develop symmetry breaking.
And whenever there is a symmetry breaking,
there is a new rigiditythat brings a new physics.

(58:47):
And then he went across fields.
He says, everything hasits own important place
and you cannot say that itcan be discovered on its own.
It needs to come from something below.
And then there are surprises.
This is also I think some peoplecall it the web of science,
connection between various things.
So emergence fascinates me.
I can't understand my own way,

(59:10):
emergence of consciousness and life.
Life is what we see,
but things like consciousnesstoo personal and too,
they call it qualia and so on.
I used to have discussionwith Phil Anderson.
He will say that that's emergence,
you can't comprehend it, doesn'tmean that it doesn't exist.
So people have strong views.

(59:30):
But the emergence that I see
in my little field ofcondensed matter physics
is mind boggling.
For example, thanks to Anderson,
he start identify quantum state
called resonating valance ground state,
which was discovered byPauling in a different context
as something veryimportant for insulators.
So he wrote it in '73, andthen in the context of qupids,
he brought it, fortunatelyfor me, I was with him.
We developed it and so on.

(59:52):
Look at the way the field has grown.
People may have forgotten Anderson,
but for example, oneof the most complicated
field in mathematics iscalled category theory.
People tell me, even pure mathematicians
call it abstract.
Now, category theory, thanksto our friend Zalgon Wen
who classified resonatingvalence ground state
and then trying to organize SPT states,

(01:00:12):
he used category theory very casually.
Now category theory is cornerof condensed metaphysics.
So nobody would've thoughtthat it'd be useful.
And once you got that, many things emerge.
I can't even understandwhat is going on there.
I wrote an article about graphene.
I had a page containingquantum complexity in graphene.
there is just carbon atom,
then it's capable of harming SP2 bonding

(01:00:34):
or SP3 or SP1 bonding.
If you go to SP3, you get diamond.
Then if you go to SP2 alone,then you get graphene.
because the bonds are 120 degree
and there is an unbonded piece at orbital,
there is a hopping in honeycomb lattice
that leads to daracon.
Because there are daracon,there are two daracon's,
(speaking in foreign language),

(01:00:54):
and the daracon's, thereis a parity anomaly
and there is anti Andersonlocalization and defects,
acting like age fieldsand then lake effects.
If you think about carbon alone,
I would not have guessedthat there is room
for composite pharmacy
So in level of few steps,you can reach that level.
So I am fascinated.

(01:01:15):
I think similarly, Wojciechhas a very fascinating thing
about emergence and liquid helium three.
In fact, I think he has a nice title
that you can see the universein a droplet of helium three,
because helium three is a helium,
you know, isotope of helium atom.
Put them together, you get liquid helium
and then they exhibit somevariety of quantum phase,
super helium three, Andersonphase, moral phase and so on.

(01:01:37):
And to look at them, there is,
you see the effective theorylooks like quantum gravity.
So that's a good example of emergence
in one component system,Helium three alone.
That fascinates me.
Even before going to living systems,
animated systems offered so much variety.
Now thanks to material science,
so we should continue to thankour experimental colleagues.
They make all kinds of materials,

(01:01:58):
starting with graphene,
now they have (indistinct).
Each one is a miracle.
People skip away and go into mathematics,
but we have to listen to phenomenons,
there are lots and lotsof fascinating things.
- You've used that word fascinating
to describe your own reactionto learning new things.
I think that's what's come through
in chatting with you last week and today
is that your curiosity is justalmost insatiable it seems,

(01:02:21):
and that you have thisgratitude for science
and its place in your life.
And that's why I thinkpeople here at Perimeter
are so excited to sit down with you
is that gratitude andenthusiasm feel infectious,
that you're helping otherpeople like us get excited.
- Yeah, I'm grateful to science.
You know, I'm happy thatI became a scientist.
II also often say thatI'm paid for my enjoyment.

(01:02:44):
What else do you expect?
I very often talk to friends that tell me,
"you know, when are you going to retire?
You are still studying."
I have no time actually.
There are no so many thingsto be understood and enjoyed.
- You don't have time to retire.
- Exactly, I have no time to retire.
- That's a good way to put it.
Well, we're very gratefulthat you've taken the time

(01:03:05):
to sit down and talk with us.
I feel so inspired toread more and learn more.
Thank you so much for taking the time.
- Thank you very much.
- Thanks for listening toConversations at The Perimeter.
If you like what you hear,
please help us spread the word.
Rate, review and subscribeto Conversations at Perimeter
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(01:03:25):
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