Theoretical Physicist and Professor @UChicago. Thought Experimenter. Dad to three tiny people working hard to maximize entropy.
Chicago, IL
Joined June 2020
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A thread on Yang-Mills theory, confinement, phases of matter, symmetry, and how one remarkable theory continues to inspire a field of research even after decades of thought.
(A biased, quasi-historical introduction to some big topics in my work.) 1/n
Happy to share my recent paper arxiv.org/abs/2610.25439
We have charted modular tensor categories to rank 22. The data we find is available at a website anyonatlas.org/ which we hope will be useful to the community.
Clay Córdova retweeted
AI and (Research) Mathematics. A thought experiment to break past the shallowness of hot takes and pre-IPO marketing. 1/
Honored to share the New Horizons Prize with Thomas Dumitrescu, Shu-Heng Shao, and Yifan Wang!
I also want to recognize the key role of my collaborators Kantaro Omori, Po-Shen Hsin, and Ho Tat Lam. This award is a celebration of our field. We have lots more to do together!
Congratulations to Clay Córdova, Shu-Heng Shao, Thomas Dumitrescu and Yifan Wang on winning the 2026 New Horizons in Physics Prize for generalizing the notion of symmetry in various ways, and for exploring the consequences of these generalized symmetries, in quantum field theory, particle physics, condensed matter physics, string theory, and quantum information theory. breakthroughprize.org/News/9…
Clay Córdova retweeted
A new theoretical study derives a massless quark solution to the strong CP problem — why strong interactions appear to preserve charge-parity symmetry — that unifies quark color and flavor and offers a new approach to beyond-the-#StandardModel physics.
🔗 go.aps.org/3In64l2
ALT An artist’s depiction of a Higgs boson interaction in 3D. Against a black background, an eight-figure of faint yellow lines and dots is in the middle of a black backdrop. To the right of the eight-figure, countless faint, pin-straight green and blue lines emanate radially from its middle intersection. To the left of the eight figure, countless faint, pin-straight pink and yellow lines, much longer than the green and blue lines emanate radially from the same intersection.
NEWS: The Leinweber Foundation is endowing five theoretical physics initiatives at Chicago, Berkeley, MIT, Michigan, and the IAS.
This $90 million gift is among the largest ever to theoretical physics!
Clay Córdova retweeted
PRB Editors' Suggestion: #DeepLearning #LatticeQaugeTheories
Anuj Apte, Clay Córdova, Tzu-Chen Huang, and Anthony Ashmore
Phys. Rev. B 110, 165133
➡️ go.aps.org/4eBupPj
#EdSugg #condmat #physics @APSPhysics @ProfClayC
ALT EDITORS' SUGGESTION Deep learning lattice gauge theories Here, the authors use gauge-invariant neural network quantum states (NNQS) to study ℤ𝑁 lattice gauge theories. They compute ground states and map out phase transitions, identifying a continuous transition in ℤ2 with Ising critical exponents and a weakly first-order transition in ℤ3. Their work demonstrates how deep learning can overcome challenges in traditional lattice simulations, providing a novel approach for exploring complex quantum phases and topological order in condensed matter systems. Anuj Apte, Clay Córdova, Tzu-Chen Huang, and Anthony Ashmore Phys. Rev. B 110, 165133 (2024)
Clay Córdova retweeted
A study of generalized global symmetries provides novel, realistic theories of particle physics beyond the standard model, including a natural description of why neutrino masses are so much smaller than those of charged leptons
Read go.aps.org/4dNXLsM
@ProfClayC @sethkoren
Clay Córdova retweeted
Congratulations @ProfClayC and Prof. Amanchuku @UChicagoPME receiving the 2023 Energy Department Early Career Research Award!
Two University of Chicago scientists win 2023 Energy Department Early Career Research awards | University of Chicago News news.uchicago.edu/story/two-…
Clay Córdova retweeted
Giving a @AspenPhysics colloquium on behalf of our hep-ph/th program is @ProfClayC
Higher symmetry in quantum physics. A nice intro to some of my recent work!
quantamagazine.org/a-new-kin…
Clay Córdova retweeted
🔥 ChatGPT the Overzealous Intern🔥
I’m your new college intern. I don’t know shit. But I’m good at Google. I can search like the best of them. If you’re over 30, then you’re clueless to my powers of searching. You think you’re good at it, but you’re not. You didn’t get weaned on it like I did.
I can get right to the good stuff on any topic. Again, I don’t know shit, but I know where all the stuff is. I’m capable, and can absorb much of the standard wisdom on any issue. Some comes from Wikipedia, old school encyclopedias, YouTube videos, substacks, online journals, news media, blogs, literature, social media conversations, and so on.
I’m just a collator. I can pull together all that’s been said on a topic, wrap my head around it, smooth it a bit, and give you the skinny.
Alternatively, I’m an “averager.” What’s the average weight of someone from the Sudan? If all their weights are online, I’ll get you that average. But, my trick is that I can even average across more complex, structured knowledge. Here’s the “average” take on this topic, or that topic. I get those takes by “averaging” across all the human takes, and sometimes there are multiple takes, in which case I’ll give you those. …like me telling you that the distribution of weights in the Sudan is bimodal, one for each sex.
Asking Google for answers is something we’ve all gotten good at. But I’m not just better at it than almost anyone. The other advantage I have is that you’ve hired me to Google-search answers to your questions all day long. That’s all I’ll do! I’ll thereby be able to come back with much more detailed and complete answers to your questions. I’m just a variety of consulting service, giving you the crowd-sourced answer to your questions, where the crowd happens to be all humankind thus far.
Did I mention I don’t know shit, but am good at collating and explaining? I think I did mention that. It’s worth emphasizing that, though.
I can’t go beyond what humankind has already discovered, because I only know what humankind as a whole knows. If there are combinations of existing areas of knowledge that lead to substantive discoveries no one’s noticed, then I won’t notice them either.
I can only notice what humankind as a crowd has noticed.
Now, if you notice that there might be important connections between two things no one has noticed, I’ll definitely be able to help you get up to speed on those two areas. But that’s a whole nother thing.
And I’m definitely of no help in making genuinely novel developments. Did I mention I’m just an intern and don’t know shit?
My first paper published in PRX!
A new class of chiral symmetries in models of massless quantum electrodynamics and axions could help explain the large ratios found among properties, such as mass, of elementary particles.
Read go.aps.org/41ZxB1m
@ProfClayC #PRXjustpublished #openaccess
Clay Córdova retweeted
Fundamental physicists face deep puzzles. Many good ideas have been ruled out or can’t be tested; devising new ideas that seem plausible and don’t clash with existing data is hard. Still, promising lines of research are being pursued. It's a long game not a blame game.
First annual meeting of the Global Categorical Symmetry Simons Collaboration! Dan Freed defining symmetry sandwiches!
I'm very happy to be part of a new Simons Collaboration at the interface of physics and mathematics, focusing on the concept of symmetry in quantum field theory!
simonsfoundation.org/2021/06…
