UCSB's Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics Awarded $2.5 Million by the Simons Foundation to Support Visiting Scientists
(Originally published by the University of California, Santa Barbara)
January 30, 2012
The Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics (KITP) at UC Santa Barbara has been awarded $2.5 million by the Simons Foundation to support the work of leading scientists on extended visits at the world-renowned research center.
Every year, the KITP hosts hundreds of leading theoretical physicists who come to Santa Barbara to explore some of the most challenging scientific questions of our time. They meet with other experts in similar and overlapping fields to explore new ideas and form pioneering collaborations. Conferences are often associated with these programs.
Nobel Prize-winner David Gross, director of the Kavli Institute, expressed his sincere appreciation for the grant from the Simons Foundation. "We are enormously grateful to the Simons Foundation for their generous award that will enable us to support extended leaves of distinguished scientists at the KITP. "
The Simons Distinguished Visiting Scientist program will provide financial assistance to supplement sabbatical leaves provided by the researchers' home institutions.
The mission of the Simons Foundation is to advance the frontiers of research in the basic sciences and mathematics. It sponsors a range of programs that "aim to promote a deeper, more fundamental understanding of our world."
Among other physics programs supported by the foundation is the Simons Center for Geometry and Physics at Stony Brook University, with which the Kavli Institute is beginning a visitor exchange program. Previously, the foundation has provided support for the recruitment of outstanding postdoctoral researchers in UCSB's Physics Department.