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TITLE: SuperStrings: Einstein's Dream at the New Millennium
SPEAKER: Sylvester James Gates Jr.
EVENT DATE: 06/05/2001
RUNNING TIME: 50 minutes
DESCRIPTION:
Dr. Gates, John S. Toll Professor of Physics at the University of Maryland, presents an audiovisual discussion of the concept of "superstrings," a new theory that describes the forces and matter that make up the universe.
Speaker Biography: Sylvester Gates received his bachelor?s degrees in both mathematics and physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1973, and he earned a Ph.D. in physics from MIT in 1977. He started his postgraduate studies as a junior fellow of the Harvard Society of Fellows at Harvard University, 1977 to 1980, and ended postgraduate work as a research fellow at the California Institute of Technology, 1980 to 1982. Gates was a member of the faculty at MIT from 1982 to 1984, then joined the University of Maryland in 1984. In 1998, he attained his current position as John S. Toll Professor Physics, becoming the first African-American to hold an endowed chair in physics at a major research university in the U.S. On leave of absence from the University of Maryland from 1991 to 1993, he served as physics professor and chair of the Physics Department at Howard University. In 2002, Gates also became Director for the Center for String and Particle Theory at the University of Maryland. A Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the American Physical Society (APS) and the National Society of Black Physicists (NSBP), Gates also was the first recipient of the APS Bouchet Award and was a past president of NSBP. He has been featured on three PBS television series: ?Breakthrough: The Changing Face of Science in America,? ?A Science Odyssey? and ?The Elegant Universe.? His next scheduled NOVA/PBS appearance will be in the fall 2005 presentation of ?E = M c-squared: The Biography of the World?s Most Famous Equation.?? Gates has received the MIT Martin Luther King, Jr. Leadership Award (1997), the College Science Teacher of the Year of the Washington Academy of Sciences (1999), an honorary degree of Doctor of Humane Letters from Georgetown University (2001) and the Klopsteg Award of the American Association of Physics Teachers (2002). T