View source for Biography:Gary Gibbons

{{EngvarB|date=July 2017}}
{{Infobox scientist
| name              = 
| honorific_suffix = {{postnom|country=GBR|size=100|FRS}}
| birth_name       = Gary William Gibbons
| native_name_lang  = 
| image             = GaryGibbons.JPG
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| caption           = Gary Gibbons at Harvard University
| birth_date        =  {{Birth date and age|df=yes|1946|7|1}}<ref name="whoswho"/>
| birth_place       = Coulsdon, London, England
| death_date        = <!-- {{Death date and age|df=yes|YYYY|MM|DD|1946|7|1}} 
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| other_names       = 
| residence         = 
| citizenship       = 
| nationality       = 
| fields            = {{Plainlist|
*Theoretical physics
*[[Physics:Euclidean quantum gravity|Euclidean quantum gravity]]}}
| workplaces        = {{Plainlist|
*[[Organization:University of Cambridge|University of Cambridge]]
*Trinity College, Cambridge
*[[Organization:Max Planck Institute for Physics|Max Planck Institute for Physics]]}}
| patrons           =
| education = Purley County Grammar School
| alma_mater        = [[Organization:University of Cambridge|University of Cambridge]] (BA, PhD)
<!-- neither St Catharine's College or  Clare College, Cambridge actually award degrees-->
| thesis_title      = Some aspects of gravitational radiation and gravitational collapse
| thesis_url        = http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.599378
| thesis_year       = 1973
| doctoral_advisor  = {{Plainlist|
*Dennis Sciama
*[[Biography:Stephen Hawking|Stephen Hawking]]<ref name="mathgene">{{MathGenealogy|id=15705}}</ref><ref name="gibbonsphd"/>}}
| academic_advisors = 
| doctoral_students = [[Biography:Chris Hull|Chris Hull]]<ref name=mathgene/><ref name=hullphd>{{cite thesis|degree=PhD|publisher=University of Cambridge|doi=|title=The structure and stability of the vacua of supergravity|first= Christopher Michael|last=Hull|date=1983|id={{EThOS|uk.bl.ethos.350108}}|url=https://idiscover.lib.cam.ac.uk/primo-explore/fulldisplay?docid=44CAM_ALMA21429685720003606&context=L&vid=44CAM_PROD&search_scope=SCOP_CAM_ALL&tab=cam_lib_coll&lang=en_US|oclc=499826125|hdl=|website=lib.cam.ac.uk}}</ref>
| notable_students  = 
| known_for         = {{Plainlist|
*[[Gibbons–Hawking ansatz]]
* [[Gibbons–Hawking space]]
* [[Physics:Gibbons–Hawking effect|Gibbons–Hawking effect]]
*[[Astronomy:Gibbons–Hawking–York boundary term|Gibbons–Hawking–York boundary term]]}}
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| influences        = 
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| awards            = {{Plainlist|
* PhD (1973)<ref name="gibbonsphd">{{cite thesis |degree=PhD |first=Gary William|last=Gibbons|title=Some aspects of gravitational radiation and gravitational collapse|publisher=[[Organization:University of Cambridge|University of Cambridge]] |year=1973|url=http://ulmss-newton.lib.cam.ac.uk/vwebv/holdingsInfo?bibId=8671
* FRS (1999)<ref name="royal"/>}}
| signature         = <!--(filename only)-->
| signature_alt     = 
| website           =  {{URL|damtp.cam.ac.uk/people/g.w.gibbons}}
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}}

'''Gary William Gibbons''' {{postnom|country=GBR|FRS}}<ref name="royal">{{cite web |url=http://royalsociety.org/DServe/dserve.exe?dsqIni=Dserve.ini&dsqApp=Archive&dsqDb=Catalog&dsqCmd=show.tcl&dsqSearch=(RefNo==%27EC%2F1999%2F16%27) |title=Library and Archive Catalogue: EC/1999/16 Gibbons, Gary William |publisher=The Royal Society |archivedate=7 February 2014 |archiveurl=https://archive.today/20140207102253/http://royalsociety.org/DServe/dserve.exe?dsqIni=Dserve.ini&dsqApp=Archive&dsqDb=Catalog&dsqCmd=show.tcl&dsqSearch=(RefNo=='EC/1999/16') |location=London |url-status=dead |df=dmy-all }}</ref> (born 1 July 1946)<ref name="whoswho">
{{Who's Who | author=Anon| surname = Gibbons | othernames = Prof. Gary William | id = U17017 | year = 2014 | doi =10.1093/ww/9780199540884.013.17017 | edition = online [[Organization:Oxford University Press|Oxford University Press]]|location=Oxford}} </ref> is a British [[Physics:Theoretical physics|theoretical physicist]].<ref name="scopus">{{Scopus|id=7201641657}}</ref><ref>''Euclidean Quantum Gravity'', [http://www.worldscibooks.com/physics/1301.html World Scientific (Singapore, 1993)] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120519211330/http://www.worldscibooks.com/physics/1301.html |date=19 May 2012 }}; Paperback {{ISBN|981-02-0516-3}}</ref>

==Education==
Gibbons was born in Coulsdon, Surrey. He was educated at Purley County Grammar School<ref name="whoswho"/> and the [[Organization:University of Cambridge|University of Cambridge]], where in 1969 he became a research student under the supervision of Dennis Sciama. When Sciama moved to the [[Organization:University of Oxford|University of Oxford]], he became a student of [[Biography:Stephen Hawking|Stephen Hawking]], obtaining his PhD from Cambridge in 1973.<ref name="gibbonsphd"/>

==Career and research==
Apart from a stay at the [[Organization:Max Planck Institute for Physics|Max Planck Institute]] in Munich in the 1970s he has remained in Cambridge throughout his career, becoming a full professor in 1997, a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1999,<ref name="royal"/> and a Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge in 2002.

Having worked on classical general relativity for his PhD thesis, Gibbons focused on the quantum theory of black holes afterwards. Together with Malcolm Perry, he used thermal [[Green's function]]s to prove the universality of thermodynamic properties of horizons, including cosmological event horizons.<ref>
{{cite journal
| title = Cosmological Event Horizons, Thermodynamics, and Particle Creation
| author = Gibbons, G. W., [[Biography:Stephen Hawking|Hawking, S. W.]]
| journal = [[Physics:Physical Review D|Physical Review D]]
| volume = 15 | issue = 10 | pages = 2738–2751
|year = 1977
| doi = 10.1103/PhysRevD.15.2738
|bibcode = 1977PhRvD..15.2738G }}</ref> He developed the [[Physics:Euclidean quantum gravity|Euclidean approach]] to quantum gravity with [[Biography:Stephen Hawking|Stephen Hawking]], which allows a derivation of the [[Astronomy:Black hole thermodynamics|thermodynamics of black holes]] from a [[Functional integral|functional integral]] approach.<ref>
{{cite journal
| title = Action Integrals and Partition Functions in Quantum Gravity
| author = Gibbons, G. W., [[Biography:Stephen Hawking|Hawking, S. W.]]
| journal = [[Physics:Physical Review D|Physical Review D]]
| volume = 15 | issue = 10 | pages = 2752–2756
|year = 1977
| doi = 10.1103/PhysRevD.15.2752
|bibcode = 1977PhRvD..15.2752G }}</ref> As the [[Biography:Euclid|Euclid]]ean action for gravity is not positive definite, the integral only converges when a particular contour is used for [[Conformal map|conformal factors]].<ref>
{{cite journal
| title = Path Integrals and the Indefiniteness of the Gravitational Action
| author = Gibbons, G. W., [[Biography:Stephen Hawking|Hawking, S. W.]], Perry, M. J.
| journal = Nucl. Phys. B
| volume = 138 | issue = 1  | pages = 141–150
|year = 1978
| doi = 10.1016/0550-3213(78)90161-X
|bibcode = 1978NuPhB.138..141G }}</ref>

His work in more recent years includes contributions to research on [[Physics:Supergravity|supergravity]], p-branes<ref>
{{cite journal
| title = Born–Infeld particles and Dirichlet p-branes
| author = Gibbons, G. W.
| journal = Nucl. Phys. B
| volume = 514| issue = 3| pages = 603–639
|year = 1998
| doi = 10.1016/S0550-3213(97)00795-5
| arxiv = hep-th/9709027
|bibcode = 1998NuPhB.514..603G }}</ref> and [[Physics:M-theory|M-theory]], mainly motivated by [[Physics:String theory|string theory]]. Gibbons remains interested in geometrical problems of all sorts which have applications to physics.

===Awards and honours===
Gibbons was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 1999. His nomination reads{{centred pull quote|Distinguished for his contributions to General Relativity and the Quantum Theory of Gravity. He played a leading role in the development of the Euclidean approach to quantum gravity and showed how it could be used to understand the thermal character of black holes and inflating universes. This revealed a deep and unexpected relationship between gravitation and thermodynamics. As part of the Euclidean quantum gravity programme, he discovered many of the known gravitational instantons and classified their properties. In the more conventional Lorentzian approach to gravity, he has studied the behaviour of solitons in gauge theories and General Relativity and has shown how supersymmetry leads to Bogomolny inequalities on the masses and charges. More recently he has been investigating the role of topology in gravity and has obtained important restrictions on how the topology of spacetime can change. He is recognised world wide as a leader in the field.<ref name="royal"/>}}

==References==
{{Reflist|35em}}


{{DEFAULTSORT:Gibbons, Gary}}
[[Category:String theorists]]

{{Sourceattribution|Gary Gibbons|1}}