Statistical physics

Computational physicist Sharon Glotzer is uncovering the rules by which complex collective phenomena emerge from simple building blocks.

A potent theory has emerged explaining a mysterious statistical law that arises throughout physics and mathematics.

Nature’s large-scale patterns emerge from incomplete surveys that borrow ideas from information theory.

An insight borrowed from computer science suggests that evolution values both fitness and diversity.

An MIT physicist has proposed the provocative idea that life exists because the law of increasing entropy drives matter to acquire lifelike physical properties.