AIP Awards Mathematical Physics Prize to Mitchell Feigenbaum of Rockefeller University

February 14, 2008

The American Institute of Physics has singled out Mitchell Feigenbaum of Rockefeller University for its 2008 Dannie Heineman Prize for Mathematical Physics. Feigenbaum is most widely known for work in nonlinear dynamics.

He will receive $7500 and a certificate in April for developing the theory of deterministic chaos, especially the universal character of period doubling, and for the profound influence of these discoveries on our understanding of nonlinear phenomena in physics. Feigenbaum's discovery of the scaling theory of the onset of chaos spawned new directions in mathematics, and moved dynamical systems into the world of physics. 

Feigenbaum, who earned a Ph.D. in theoretical high energy physics under Francis Low at MIT in 1970, has been at Rockefeller University since 1986. In 1996 he became the Director of the university's Center for Studies in Physics and Biology. He is a Fellow of the APS and a member of both the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Among his many prizes and awards are the Lawrence Award (1982); a MacArthur Foundation Award (1986); and the Wolf Prize in Physics (1986).

Source: American Institute of Physics