Curriculum Vitae

Hirosi Ooguri
(spelled as "Hiroshi Oguri" in government documents)
Fred Kavli Professor and Director
Walter Burke Institute for Theoretical Physics
California Institute of Technology
Mail Code 452-48, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
Director
Kavli Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe
University of Tokyo
Kashiwa, 277-8583, Japan
Chair of the Board of Trustees
Aspen Center for Physics
700 W Gillespie Street, Aspen, CO 81611, USA
Simons Investigator
Simons Foundation
160 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010, USA
Email: ooguri@caltech.edu
Biosketch
Finishing his graduate study in two years, Ooguri became a tenured faculty member at the University of Tokyo in 1986. He was a member of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton in 1988-89 and was appointed an Assistant Professor at the University of Chicago before receiving his Ph.D. in 1989. After serving as an Associate Professor at Kyoto University for four years, he returned to the United States as a Full Professor of Physics at UC Berkeley in 1994. He moved to Caltech in 2000, where he is the inaugural holder of the Fred Kavli Chair.
At Caltech, Ooguri served as the Deputy Chair of the Division of Physics, Mathematics, and Astronomy, equivalent of a Vice Dean of Physical Sciences. He led the establishment of the Walter Burke Institute for Theoretical Physics in 2014 and has been its Founding Director since then.
Ooguri also helped establish the Kavli Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe (Kavli IPMU) of the University of Tokyo in Japan in 2007. After serving as its Principal Investigator for 11 years, he became the Director in 2018.
Ooguri was a General Member of the Aspen Center for Physics for 20 years until 2023, when he was elected an Honorary Trustee for Life. He served as the Scientific Secretary (2010-11), a Trustee (2011-16), and the President of the Center (2016-2019). Since 2021, he has been the Chair of the Board of Trustees.
Ooguri has received the Medal of Honor with Purple Ribbon from the Emperor of Japan, the Eisenbud Prize for Mathematics and Physics from the American Mathematical Society, the Simons Investigator Award from the Simons Foundation, the Guggenheim Fellowship, the Hamburg Prize and the Humboldt Research Award in Germany, the Benjamin Lee Distinguished Professorship in Korea, and the Nishina Memorial Prize and the Chunichi Cultural Award in Japan. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and of the American Mathematical Society.
Ooguri's popular science books have sold over 300,000 copies in Japan, and one of them was awarded the Kodansha Prize for Science Books. He also supervised a science movie, which was selected for the Best Educational Production Award from the International Planetarium Society and has been translated into six languages.
Education
Year | Degree | Institution |
---|---|---|
1989 | Doctor of Science, Doctoral Thesis | University of Tokyo |
1986 | Master of Science | Kyoto University |
1984 | Bachelor of Science | Kyoto University |
Employment
Positions at California Institute of Technology
Year | Position |
---|---|
2007 - present | Fred Kavli Professor in Theoretical Physics and Mathematics |
2014 - present | Founding Director of the Walter Burke Institute for Theoretical Physics |
2010 - 2015 | Deputy Chair of the Division of Physics, Mathematics, and Astronomy |
2000 - 2007 | Professor of Theoretical Physics |
Positions at Other Institutions
Year | Position | Institution |
---|---|---|
2018 - 2023 | Director of the Kavli IPMU | University of Tokyo |
1994 - 2000 | Professor | University of California, Berkeley |
1995 - 2000 | Faculty Senior Scientist | Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory |
1990 - 1994 | Associate Professor at RIMS | Kyoto University |
1989 - 1990 | Assistant Professor | University of Chicago |
1988 - 1989 | Member | Institute for Advanced Study |
1986 - 1989 | Assistant Professor | University of Tokyo |
Professional Activities
Year | Year | Institution |
---|---|---|
2023 - present | Honorary Trustee for Life | Aspen Center for Physics |
2021 - present | Chair of the Board of Trustees | Aspen Center for Physics |
2016 - 2019 | President | Aspen Center for Physics |
2011 - 2016 | Trustee | Aspen Center for Physics |
2010 - 2011 | Scientific Secretary | Aspen Center for Physics |
2003 - 2023 | Member | Aspen Center for Physics |
2007 - 2018 | Principal Investigator (Director 2018 - 2023) | Kavli IPMU |
Awards & Honors
Year | Award | Awarding Body |
---|---|---|
2023 | Guggenheim Fellowship | Guggenheim Foundation |
2022 | Science Lectureship Award | Chiba University |
2021 | Benjamin Lee Distinguished Professorship | Korean Physical Society and APCTP |
2019 | Medal of Honor with Purple Ribbon | Emperor of Japan |
2019 | Nishina Memorial Lecture | Nishina Memorial Foundation |
2018 | Hamburg Prize | Joachim Herz Foundation |
2017 | Member | Japan Writers' Association |
2016 | Best Educational Production Award | International Planetarium Society |
2016 | Fellow | American Academy of Arts and Sciences |
2016 | Chunichi Cultural Award | Chunichi Shimbun |
2014 | Kodansha Prize for Science Books | Kodansha |
2012 | Fellow in the Inaugural Class | American Mathematical Society |
2012 | Simons Investigator (2012 - 2016, 2023 - 2029) | Simons Foundation |
2009 | Nishina Memorial Prize | Nishina Memorial Foundation |
2009 | Takagi Lecturer | Mathematical Society of Japan |
2008 | Humboldt Research Award | Alexandar Von Humboldt Foundation |
2008 | Eisenbud Prize for Mathematics and Physics | American Mathematical Society |


Left: Nishina Prize Ceremony with 3 Nobel Laureates: Masatoshi Koshiba, Makoto Kobayashi, and Toshihide Maskawa.
Right: Hamburg Prize Ceremony at the Planetarium Hamburg [photos courtesy of Joachim Herz Stiftung/Claudia Höhne]
Research Publication
Visiting Appointments
Year | Institution | Appointment |
---|---|---|
2019 Spring | Galileo Galilei Institute, Florence | Simons Visiting Professor |
2016 Spring | Harvard University | Visiting Scholar |
2015 Fall | Institute for Advanced Study | Director's Visiting Professor |
2007 Spring | University of Tokyo | Visiting Professor |
1994 Fall | Université Pierre-et-Marie-Curie, Paris | Visiting Professor |
1992 Fall -1993 Summer | Harvard University | Visiting Scholar |
Services to Caltech
Year | Committee | Role |
---|---|---|
2003 - present | Physics Colloquium Committee | Chair in 2012 - 2015 and 2019 - 2023 |
2001 - 2019 | Physics Faculty Search Committee | Co-Chair in 2003 - 2006 |
2015 - 2016 | Physics Graduate Committee | |
2012 - 2015 | Undergraduate Admissions Committee | |
2011 - 2014 | University Faculty Board | Steering Committee Member in 2012 - 2014 |
2001 - 2002 and 2010 - 2012 | PMA Long-Term Strategic Planning Committee | Chair in 2010 - 2012 |
2004 - 2017 | Mathematics Faculty Search Committee |
Advisory and Review Committees
Year | Committee |
---|---|
Multiple Years | Review Panels for DOE and NSF |
2005-2008 | Advisory Committee of Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics, UC Santa Barbara |
2005-present | International Scientific Committee of "Strings" Conference Series |
2008, 2012, 2015, 2018 | Advisory Committee of Solvay Institutes |
2008-2011 | Advisory Committee of Banff International Research Station |
2011-present | Steering Committee of Kavli Asian Winter School |
2013-2017 | Steering Committee of Research Institute for Mathematical Sciencers at Kyoto University |
2013 | Review Committee of Institute for Theoretical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences |
2015 | Scientific Committee of International Congress of Mathematical Physics |
2016, 2019 | Permanent Staff Search Committee of CERN Theory Group |
2018-present | Advisory Committee of Center for Quantum Mathematics and Physics at UC Davis |
2018 | Review Committee of Korea Institute for Advanced Study |
2018 | Review Committee of Tata Institute of Fundamental Research |
2019 | Lead Editor Search Committee for Physical Review D |
2019-present | Scientific Council of ICTP-AP, Beijing |
2019-present | Advisory Committee of Cluster of Excellence Quantum Universe at Hamburg University |
2019-present | Steering Committee of "String-Math" Conference Series |
2020 | Elector, Rouse Ball Professorship, Oxford University |
2020 | Committee of Visitors, US Department of Energy, Office of High Energy Physics |
2020-present | International Advisory Board, Tohoku Forum for Creativity, Tohoku University |
2020-present | International Scientific Committee, Beijing Institute of Mathematical Sciences and Applications |
2022-present | Scientific Committee of Pollica Physics Centre in Salerno, Italy |
2023-2025 | Advisory Board, Universities for International Research Excellence, MEXT, Japan |
2023-2025 | Advisory Panel on Functions and Organization of the Science Council of Japan, Cabinet Office, Japan |
Prize Selection Committee
Year | Prize |
---|---|
2014 | Kyoto Prize |
2016 - present | Nishina Memorial Prize |
2017, 2018, 2022 | Soros Fellowship for New Americans |
2019 | Hoshi Shinichi Literary Award |
2019 - 2020 | Inamori Research Institute for Science Fellowship |
2022 - present | Marie Sklodowska Curie Award |
2023 - present | American Academy of Arts and Sciences Membership Panel |
Editorial Boards
Year | Journal |
---|---|
1997-2006 | Journal of High Energy Physics (JHEP) |
1997-present | Advances in Theoretical and Mathematical Physics |
1998-2013 | Nuclear Physics B |
2006-2009 | Physical Review D |
2014-2015 | Communications in Mathematical Physics |
2019- | SpringerBriefs in Mathematical Physics |
Conference Organization
"Strings" Conferences |
Strings 1998 Santa Barbara, California Strings 2003 Kyoto, Japan Strings 2018 Okinawa, Japan (Member of the Planning Committee since 2022) |
"String-Math" Conference |
String-Math 2018 Sendai, Japan (Member of the Steering Committee since 2019) |
Aspen Center for Physics Workshops |
Duality in Physics and Mathematics (1996) Strings, Branes, and Superpotentials, (2004) String theory and Quantum Geometry (2007) Unity of String Theory (2009) Mathematics of Superconformal Field Theory (2013) |
Burke Institute Conferences at Caltech |
Inaugural Symposium (2015) Gravitational Wave (2014) Grassmannian Geometry and Scattering Amplitudes (2014) F-Theory at 20 (2016) General Relativity at 100 (2016) |
Kavli IPMU Conferences |
Opening Symposium (2008) Theoretical Physics and Mathematics in Asia (2008) Quantum Black Holes (2008) Wall Crossing and New Invariants (2009) Condensed Matter and String Theory (2010) Gauge and String Theory (2013) Holography and QCD (2013) Goddard Symposium (2014) Condensed Matter and AdS/CFT (2015) Seiberg Symposium (2016) Statistics, Quantum Information, and Gravity (2016) Kavli IPMU 10th Anniversary Symposium (2017) |
Kavli Asian Winter School |
Kusatsu, Japan (2012) Okinawa, Japan (2016) Sendai, Japan (2020) (Member of the Steering Committee since 2011) |
KITP Workshops, Santa Barbara |
Duality in String Theory (1998) Mathematical Structure in String Theory (2005) Swampland and Quantum Gravity Constraints (2019) |
ICTP Spring School, Trieste | Co-Director with Ashoke Sen in 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006 |
Simons Symposia on Quantum Entanglement |
2013, 2015, 2017 |
Galileo Galilei Institute Workshop, Florence | String and M Theory Approaches to Particle Physics and Cosmology (2007) |
Americal Physical Society Meetings |
DPF meeting at the College of William and Mary (2002) Joint Meeting of DPF and JPS in Honolulu, Hawaii (2006) |
Banff International Research Station Conference | Frontiers in String Theory (2006) |
International Congres of Mathematical Physics | String Theory Session, Lisbon (2003) |
John Schwarz's 60th Birthday Conference | Caltech (2001) |
John Schwarz's 75th Birthday Conference | Caltech (2016) |
Tohru Eguchi's 60th Birthday Conference | Kyoto (2008) |
The 50th Anniversary of the Quark Prediction | Caltech (2013) |
Murray Gell-Mann Memorial Symposium | Caltech (2020) |




Ooguri organized Strings 1998, 2003, 2018 and String-Math 2018
(chaired the organizing committees of Strings 2018 and String-Math 2018).