David Skinner wins best paper prize

Skinner did the research when he was a Perimeter postdoctoral fellow. After finishing that fellowship, he obtained a faculty appointment at the University of Cambridge. Currently, he is seconded to the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. He also remains an active part of Perimeter’s research community: his status as one of Perimeter’s 10 Visiting Fellows means that he can make extended research visits of up to six months each.

Skinner’s research lies at the intersection of quantum field theory and gravity. More particularly, he is studying the rich geometric structure that lies behind gauge and gravitational scattering amplitudes, and their relation to twistor theory and string theory. He is widely considered a pioneer in this particular area of mathematical physics, which has been extensively developed here at Perimeter.

Mason and Skinner’s winning paper was chosen, alongside two other papers, by the editorial board of Journal of Physics A. It is being honoured for excellence, novelty, achievement, and potential impact. The full text of the paper has been made free to read on IOPscience until the end of 2013.

This marks the second year in a row that Perimeter researchers have won this prize. In 2012, along with collaborators, Perimeter Faculty member Pedro Vieira and Senior Postdoctoral Fellow Amit Sever won for their paper, “Y-system for scattering amplitudes.”