Description:

Join fellow Brown alumni and friends in Southern California for a special program with Physics Professor Brad Marston entitled "The Quantum Mechanics of Global Warming." Quantum mechanics plays a crucial, albeit often overlooked, role in determining the Earth's climate. Feynman's famous two-slit interference experiment gives us the key to understanding climate. I use this understanding to present a simple physical picture of what will happen to the Earth as the concentrations of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide continue to increase.

Professor Marston joined the Brown Physics Department in 1991. A graduate of Caltech, he received his Ph.D. from Princeton University in 1989. He has done postdoctoral work at Cornell University and was a visiting scientist at the Institute for Theoretical Physics at UC Santa Barbara. Prof. Marston is an Alfred P. Sloan Fellow and a recipient of a National Young Investigator Award from the National Science Foundation.