Research
I am a theoretical physicist seeking the physical principles that connect phenomena across scales: from black holes and quantum matter to living systems and societies. My research explores how collective behaviour emerges from the interactions of many constituents, and how seemingly different systems can be understood through a common theoretical framework.
At the University of Amsterdam, I lead a research group on hydrodynamics and collective behaviour across scales. We develop effective theories that capture the essential physics of complex systems, with applications ranging from string theory and gravity to high-energy and astrophysical plasmas, quantum materials, and soft and active matter. Hydrodynamics provides a particularly powerful language for connecting these fields.
Collaboration is central to this work. I bring together theorists and experimentalists across physics and work with researchers in other disciplines to understand emergence in ecosystems and social dynamics. As coordinator of the Dutch Institute for Emergent Phenomena (DIEP) and principal investigator of Emergence at All Scales, I help build collaborations across disciplinary and institutional boundaries.
Explore my publications, or visit my Google Scholar profile.
Research group
At the University of Amsterdam I work with a group of exceptional researchers.
Connections across scales
Research themes
From black-hole horizons to living materials and social networks, my research explores how collective behaviour emerges from underlying interactions and symmetries. These ten overlapping themes offer different routes into my work.
String theory
Branes provide a bridge between microscopic theories of gravity and effective descriptions of matter. My work explores their symmetries, thermal behaviour and stability, from giant gravitons and metastable anti-branes to the higher-group structure of M-theory.
Black holes
How many shapes can a black hole take, and which of them are stable? I construct and study black holes beyond four dimensions, using effective fluid and elastic descriptions to uncover new horizon geometries and understand their dynamics.
Quantum matter
Symmetry and collective motion reveal common principles across very different quantum phases. I develop effective theories of fracton superfluids, electronic crystals and systems with topological defects, connecting their unusual conservation laws to transport, plasticity and phase transitions.
Active matter
Living and driven materials consume energy to move, organise and flow. I study how activity changes thermodynamics and hydrodynamics, including the meaning of temperature in active nematics and the unusual forces experienced by particles in active viscoelastic fluids.
Astrophysics
From the Sun’s interior to the surroundings of rotating black holes, magnetised plasmas connect fluid motion with electromagnetic fields. My work explores hierarchical turbulent scaling in molecular gas, topological waves in the solar tachocline, black hole energy extraction and effective descriptions of relativistic plasma dynamics.
Hydrodynamics
Hydrodynamics describes how complex systems behave at long distances and late times. I develop this framework beyond conventional fluids, exploring the roles of symmetry, broken boosts and ultrarelativistic limits, including fluids at zero temperature and Carrollian fluid dynamics.
Quark-gluon plasma
Hot relativistic matter calls for fluid theories that account for spin, electromagnetic fields and quantum anomalies. My work develops theoretical tools relevant to quark-gluon plasma, examining spin thermodynamics, the chiral anomaly and stable, causal magnetohydrodynamics.
Holography
Holography relates strongly interacting quantum systems to higher-dimensional gravity. I use this connection to study gauge theories, collective transport and charge density waves, and to uncover new links between gravitational dynamics and fluid mechanics.
Social dynamics
Ideas from statistical physics can illuminate collective behaviour in society. I study how network structure, risk preferences and spatial fluctuations shape opinion polarisation, cooperation and urban populations, seeking simple mechanisms behind complex social patterns.
Generalized symmetries
Symmetries can act on extended objects such as lines and surfaces, rather than only on particles. I use higher-form and higher-group symmetries to build effective theories of matter and branes, exploring how symmetry breaking and topological defects shape collective dynamics, transport and phase transitions.
Images are conceptual illustrations.
Past members
A list of past members of my research group
Akash Jain
(2021-2025)
Postdoc and Marie-Curie Fellow
Gian-Piero Nicosia
(2021-2026)
PhD student
George Batzios
(2021-2026)
PhD student
Piotr Surówka
Visiting Professor from January to August 2022
Richard Green
Postdoc from September 2019 to 2021 (joint with Jan de Boer and Luca Giomi)