May 8, 1998

Physics professor awarded Humboldt Research Prize

Carl Brans, Ph.D., recently was awarded the Humboldt Research Foundation Senior Prize in recognition of his research achievements in physics.

The award is given by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation which grants up to 100 Humboldt Senior Research Awards a year to eminent foreign scientists and scholars who hold doctorates to carry out long-term research projects. The awards are intended to promote cooperation between foreign and German researchers and their institutes in specific fields of research. Nominations for Humboldt Research Awards are made only by leading German scholars or research institutions.

“ I am honored to have been selected as one of the Humboldt Award recipients. I am grateful that this award gives me the opportunity to work with my colleagues in Germany as well as the time and resources to continue my research in physics,” noted Brans.

This award will allow Brans to spend the last six months in 1998 working with physicists throughout Germany on foundation theories of space and time, Einstein theory, and alternatives. Brans’ base during this time will be at the Institute for Theoretical Physics in Cologne.

Brans’ 1961 doctoral thesis from Princeton University developed into what has generally been known as the Brans-Dicke theory. The Brans-Dicke theory which modified the standard Einstein’s theory to include another, a scalar, in addition to Einstein’s metric field. Since its introduction, the Brans-Dicke theory has been the most widely considered alternative to Einstein’s theory of gravitation and general relativity. The promulgation of such a competitor to Einstein’s theory led to much experimental research during the ’60s and ’70s including the lunar laser reflector placed on the moon by the Apollo astronauts.

The Einstein theory and the Brans-Dicke theory predict almost identical results in the solar system context, but experiments seemed to favor the Einstein theory, so interest in scalar-tensor alternatives waned during the ’70s. However, in the ’80s, interest in such theories exploded again with developments in fields such as cosmology and superstring theory. The evolution of the universe to its present stage seems to require a large number of coincidences near the big bang in standard Einstein cosmology.

“On behalf of Loyola, I would like to congratulate Dr. Brans on being the recipient of this prestigious international award,” said Provost David Danahar. It is an honor to be nominated and an even greater honor to be chosen as one of the 100 recipients of a Humboldt Senior Research Award. This award is a tribute to Dr. Brans’ life-long research and work in the field of physics.”

–Kristine David, Director of Public Affairs