Sergio Ferrara

Sergio Ferrara (1945-) is an Italian physicist. He is a professor at the University of California, Los Angeles. He co-discovered supergravity in 1976.

Early years

Sergio Ferrara was born on 2 May, 1945 in Rome, Italy. He graduated from the University of Rome in 1968. Since then he has worked as a CNEN and INFN researcher at the Frascati National Laboratories; as a CNRS Visiting Scientist at the Laboratoire de Physique Theorique, Ecole Normale Superieure, Paris, and at the Theoretical Studies Division at CERN, Geneva.

upergravity

In 1976, Sergio Ferrara, Daniel Z. Freedman, and Peter van Nieuwenhuizen discovered Supergravity at Stony Brook University in New York. It was initially proposed as a four-dimensional theory. The theory of supergravity generalizes Einstein's theory of general relativity by incorporating the principles of supersymmetry.

Later years

In 1980 he was made a full professor of theoretical physics in Italy. He became a staff member of the Theory Division at CERN in 1981. In 1985, he became a Professor of Physics at the University of California, Los Angeles. Since 1986 he has been a senior staff member of the Physics Department at CERN.

Awards

In 1993 he received the Dirac Medal and Prize from ICTP (Trieste) and in 2006 (with D. Freedman and P. Van Nieuwenhuizen) he received the Dannie Heineman Prize for Mathematical Physics from the APS. In 2005 he received an Honorary Degree in Physics, "Laurea Honoris Causa", from the 2nd University of Rome (Tor Vergata, Italy), and (with G. Veneziano, CERN, and B. Zumino, Berkeley) was awarded the Enrico Fermi Prize of the Italian Physical Society.

ee also

*Supersymmetry
*Supergravity

External links

* [http://www.aps.org/programs/honors/prizes/prizerecipient.cfm?name=Sergio%20Ferrara 2006 Dannie Heineman Prize for Mathematical Physics Recipient]
* [http://personnel.physics.ucla.edu/directory/faculty/index.php?f_name=ferrara Sergio Ferrara's profile at UCLA]