Stanley Deser was born on 19 March 1931 in Rovno (then Poland) and had a nomadic childhood in the turbulent thirties, including Poland, Palestine, France and Portugal before reaching the United States in May 1941.
Still moving a great deal until New York, where he finished High School and entered Brooklyn College, he received BS Summa cum Laude in 1949 and then attended Harvard Graduate School. He received an MA in 1950 and his PhD in 1953, under Nobel laureate Julian Schwinger. He was a Postdoc at Institute for Advanced Study 1953-5 and Niels Bohr Institute 1955-7. He was an Instructor Harvard 1957-8, thence Associate to Full (endowed Chair) Professor at Brandeis University (emeritus 2005). He held numerous visiting foreign posts include CERN, Sorbonne, College de France, All Souls, Oxford, Kings and Imperial London. Currently, he holds research appointments at Brandeis University and Caltech.
His primary accomplishments, in High Energy and Gravitational Physics, included the ADM formulation of General Relativity, establishing existence of gravitational radiation and defining “ADM” energy, a long time grail, discovery of Supergravity - now a major industry, topologically massive gravity, gauge theories and trace anomalies.
Honours included Dannie Heineman Prize in Mathematical Physics, Einstein Medal, (several) Fulbright and Guggenheim awards and Loeb lecturer, Harvard. He was a Fellow of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a Foreign Member of the Torino Academy. He held Honorary PhDs from the universities of Stockholm (Centennial) and Gothenburg.
Professor Stanley Deser ForMemRS died on 21 April 2023.
Professional position
- Senior Research Associate, Brandeis University
- Senior Research Associate, Institute for Theoretical Physics, California Institute of Technology
