Daniel Rothman

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Daniel Rothman is a professor of geophysics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He uses quantitative methods, inspired in part by modern ideas in statistical physics, to understand the cooperative processes that create and maintain our natural environment.

At Radcliffe, Rothman will study how carbon cycles through the atmosphere, oceans, living organisms, and rocks. The problem ostensibly falls at the intersection of earth science, biology, and chemistry. However, a wide range of environments and biogeochemical transformations exhibit common features suggesting that physical mechanisms exert significant control. Rothman will seek a fundamental understanding of these physical processes. He will also explore their relevance to recent global warming and past environmental change associated with the evolution of life.

Rothman has published widely in earth science, physics, and biology, and is a coauthor of Lattice-Gas Cellular Automata: Simple Models of Complex Hydrodynamics (Cambridge University Press, 1997). He received his AB from Brown University and his PhD from Stanford University and has held visiting appointments at École Normale Superieure, Université Pierre et Marie Curie (Paris VI), and the University of Chicago.