Background
Robertus Henricus Dijkgraaf was born on 24 January 1960 in Ridderkerk, Netherlands.
columnist mathematician physicist university professor writer
Robertus Henricus Dijkgraaf was born on 24 January 1960 in Ridderkerk, Netherlands.
Bachelor of Science in Physics, cum laude, Utrecht University, Netherlands, 1982. Master of Science in Theoretical Physics, cum laude, Utrecht University, Netherlands, 1986. Doctor of Philosophy cum laude, Utrecht University, Netherlands, 1989.
He is tenured professor at the University of Amsterdam, and director and Leon Levy professor at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. He lives in Princeton, New Jersey. Dijkgraaf is married to the author Pia de Jong and has three children.
Dijkgraaf went to Erasmiaans Gymnasium in Rotterdam, Netherlands.
He started his education in physics at Utrecht University in 1978. After completing his Bachelor"s degree equivalent in 1982 he briefly turned away from physics to pursue painting at the Gerrit Rietveld Academie.
In 1984, he returned to Utrecht University, to start on his master"s degree in theoretical physics. The original arrangement was that only one of the trio would work on string theory, but all three ended up writing their thesis on this subject.
Dijkgraaf obtained his doctorate in 1989 cum laude.
His thesis was titled A Geometrical Approach to Two Dimensional Conformal Field Theory. Subsequently, Dijkgraaf held positions at Princeton University and the Institute for Advanced Study. In 1992, he was appointed professor at the University of Amsterdam, where he held the chair of mathematical physics until 2004, when he was appointed distinguished professor at the same university.
In the Netherlands, Dijkgraaf is a promoter of hard sciences.
He regularly appears on Dutch television and has a (monthly) column in the Dutch newspaper National Research Council Handelsblad. He was elected as one of the two co-chairs of the InterAcademy Council for the period 2009-2013.
Starting 1 July 2012 Dijkgraaf became the director of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. Dijkgraaf"s research focuses on string theory and the interface of mathematics and physics in general.
He is best known for his work on topological string theory and matrix models, and his name has been given to the Dijkgraaf-Witten invariants and the Witten-Dijkgraaf-Verlinde-Verlinde formula.
Member of Royal Holland Society Sciences, Royal Netherlands Academy Arts & Sciences (president since 2008), Dutch Mathematics Physics Society (member executive board 1996-1999, chairman executive board since 1999), American Physical Society, American Mathematics Society, International Association Mathematics Physics.