CAS Professor of Physics Emeritus

Research Professor of Physics

George and Ann Fisher Distinguished Professor of Engineering

Professor Baym is a theoretical physicist with unusually wide interests. His research activities span condensed matter physics, statistical physics, low-temperature physics, astrophysics, nuclear physics, and the history of physics.

A pioneer in the study of pulsars and neutron stars, and more generally the nature of the matter under extreme conditions of density and pressure, he is currently involved in studies of high-density matter in the laboratory using high-energy particle accelerators to recreate on earth, albeit briefly, the conditions in neutron stars and the early universe. His present research also aims at understanding the properties of condensed atomic gases, the coldest systems in the universe. In earlier work he made important advances in the methods of quantum statistical mechanics. He continues to serve on various national physics advisory committees. He was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1981); the National Academy of Sciences (1982), where he chaired the Physics Section from 1995 to 1998; and the American Philosophical Society (2000). He is the recipient of the 2002 Hans Bethe Prize of the American Physical Society and a co-recipient of the 2008 Lars Onsager Prize of the American Physical Society, and a recipient of the 2011 Feenberg Medal.

SPECIAL EVENT Quantum Fluids from nK to TeV: An 80th Birthday Symposium in Honor of CAS Professor Emeritus of Physics Gordon Baym