The Ministry of Science and ICT and the Asia Pacific Center for Theoretical Physics said on the 19th that they had selected Christopher Jarzynski (pictured), a Distinguished University Professor at the University of Maryland, as this year's winner of the Benjamin Lee Prize.
Jarzynski is a leading authority in statistical physics and non-equilibrium thermodynamics, and he devised the Jarzynski equality, which derives free-energy differences even in non-equilibrium processes. He was also recognized for shaping modern statistical physics by uncovering microscopic thermodynamic properties across nano, biological and quantum systems through research including stochastic thermodynamics. The Asia Pacific Center for Theoretical Physics will host Jarzynski at POSTECH in Pohang, North Gyeongsang Province, on the 19th and 20th for a special lecture on non-equilibrium statistical physics. The Benjamin Lee Prize is the only academic award in South Korea named after the late Benjamin W. Lee, a physicist who made groundbreaking contributions to theoretical physics.