I am a cosmologist at the Institute for Astrophysics and Space Sciences at the University of Lisbon.
Resources for my student group, known as The Daredevils, are here.
Marina Cortês is an astrophysicist who challenges conventional notions as to the nature of time. She is particularly concerned with the issue of how the direction (arrow) of time, so obvious to us in our lives, can emerge from physical laws in which time can be reversed without consequence. Her research work has already won the inaugural Buchalter Cosmology Prize awarded in the USA.
Cortês has more than 15 years experience in cosmology. She worked in three continents, including Berkeley National Lab, and UC Berkeley, the Perimeter Institute in Canada, and the Royal Observatory of Edinburgh in the UK. She is now research faculty at the Institute for Astrophysics and Space Sciences in Lisbon, Portugal. She has worked both in large observational collaborations such as the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, and from a purely theoretical perspective.
Her work has influenced our understanding of the Universe’s youngest stages, the mystery of its present acceleration, and especially the fundamental nature of time itself. Her 2013 Phys. Rev. Letters article `Anomalies in an Open Universe’ was selected as Special Highlight by the American Physical Society, an honour given only to less than 1% of all publications in this already exclusive journal. In 2015 her article `The Universe as Unique Events’ was awarded the USD 10,000 Inaugural Buchalter Cosmology Prize, jointly with Lee Smolin.
Marina Cortês is currently founding a new scientific field, Biocosmology. It is the first bridge connecting cosmology and biology, scientific areas which were previously disconnected though lack of a common mathematical framework and tools, between the two up till now.
Biocosmology allows us to see life through the lens of black holes, dark energy, and dark matter. It is the first quantification, ever, of the value of our planet before the vastness of the cosmos.
Biocosmology creates the extension of the multiple-award-winning research programme on the irreversibility of time, founded by her and Lee Smolin – see here. Together they have been challenging the understanding of time in physics since 2012.
First introduced at the Google SciFoo meetings in May 2021, 6 mins introduction to biocosmology here:
Now, together with:
she is extending her previous program of “Foundational Time Irreversibility’’ to approach quantum biology and the brain.
The scientific press release took place on April 21st, 2022. The three accompanying scientific papers are in our webpage: Biocosmology
Press:
Together with the scientific articles a non-technical news piece was published in coordination with the Institute of Arts and Ideas, together with Ed McGovern.
She is also premiering in the Hollywood production The Shape of History
This trilogy of groundbreaking documentary programs will take us on a journey through cosmic history to explore our evolving understanding of our universe – and humankind’s place within it.
“Humans are of nature not above nature’’
Shape of History is a radical paradigm shift for the replacing of the human species to its natural place as only one of the many elements in the fantastic circle of life.
Organization:
Stuart Kauffman
MacArthur Prize, Author, Royal Society of Canada Fellow
George Colburn
Executive Producer
Chris Shaws
Filmmaker, Producer
Dean Love
Producer
Paul Marcus
Advancement
Marina Cortês has more than 15 years experience in cosmology. She worked in three continents, including National Berkeley Lab and UC Berkeley, the Perimeter Institute in Canada, and the Royal Observatory of Edinburgh in the UK, before taking up her current position at the Institute for Astrophysics and Space Sciences in Lisbon, Portugal. She has worked both in large observational collaborations such as the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, and from a purely theoretical perspective.
Her work has influenced our understanding of the Universe’s youngest stages, the mystery of its present acceleration, and especially the fundamental nature of time itself. Her 2013 Phys. Rev. Letters article `Anomalies in an Open Universe’ was selected as Special Highlight by the American Physical Society, an honour given only to less than 1% of all publications in this already exclusive journal. In 2015 her article `The Universe as Unique Events’ was awarded the USD 10,000 Inaugural Buchalter Cosmology Prize, jointly with Lee Smolin.
Marina Cortês at Perimeter Institute
Unconference at Perimeter Institute, 2016
A global meeting that brought the world’s top experts on the millenia old puzzle of “Time’’. The event took place at Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics (Canada).
The uniqueness of this event was described in this Quanta Magazine article by Dan Falk The invitation-only meeting brought together leading intellectuals from all continents on theoretical physics, cosmology, biologists, philosophers, musicians and even visual artists. The conference featured a live interactive performance involving 100 metronomes, `Time is the Essence’.
Organisers:
-Marina Cortês (Institute for Astrophysics and Space Sciences, Portugal)
-Roberto Mangabeira Unger (Harvard Law)
-Lee Smolin (Perimeter Institute)
Welcome and Opening Remarks by Cortês, M., Smolin, L. & Turok, N. (2016).
Abstract, Participants and Seminars here
Marina Cortês and Lee Smolin, worth US$10,000
Anúncio Prémio Publico 6 Janeiro de 2015 ( Portuguese Press)
Viewpoint on her work:
Is the Lopsided Universe an Open Universe? by Marc Kamionkowski (Johns Hopkins University, USA)
