Geoffrey West
| Geoffrey West | |
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| Born | 1940 Taunton, Somerset, United Kingdom |
| Residence | United States |
| Fields | Theoretical physics Theoretical biology |
| Institutions | Santa Fe Institute Los Alamos National Laboratory University of New Mexico |
| Alma mater | Cambridge University Stanford University |
| Known for | Metabolic theory of ecology |
| Notable awards | Mercer Award |
Geoffrey Brian West (born 1940 in Taunton, Somerset) is a British theoretical physicist, former president and distinguished professor of the Santa Fe Institute. He is one of the leading scientists working on a scientific model of cities. Among other things his work states that with the doubling of a city's size, services per capita will generally increase by 15%.[1]
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Early life and education [edit]
Geoffrey West was born in 1940 in Taunton, Somerset, a rural town in western England and moved to London when he was 13.[2] He received a bachelor's degree in physics from Cambridge and pursued graduate studies at Stanford, California.
Career [edit]
He eventually became a Stanford faculty member before he joined the particle theory group at New Mexico's Los Alamos National Laboratory. After Los Alamos, he became president of the Santa Fe Institute, where he worked and works on biological issues such as the allometric law[3] and other power laws in biology.[4][5]
Awards [edit]
He has since been honored as one of Time magazine's Time 100.[6] He is a member of the World Knowledge Dialogue Scientific Board.[7]
See also [edit]
References [edit]
- ^ Bettencourt, L. M. A.; Lobo, J.; Helbing, D.; Kuhnert, C.; West, G. B. (2007). "Growth, innovation, scaling, and the pace of life in cities". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 104 (17): 7301–7306. doi:10.1073/pnas.0610172104. PMC 1852329. PMID 17438298.
- ^ "Geoffrey West". Physics Central. Retrieved 2006-05-02.
- ^ West, G. B.; Brown, J. H.; Enquist, B. J. (1997). "A General Model for the Origin of Allometric Scaling Laws in Biology". Science 276 (5309): 122–126. doi:10.1126/science.276.5309.122. PMID 9082983.
- ^ West, G. B.; Brown, J. H.; Enquist, B. J. (2001). "A general model for ontogenetic growth". Nature 413 (6856): 628–631. doi:10.1038/35098076. PMID 11675785.
- ^ Gillooly, J. F.; Brown, J. H.; West, G. B.; Savage, V. M.; Charnov, E. L. (2001). "Effects of Size and Temperature on Metabolic Rate". Science 293 (5538): 2248–2251. doi:10.1126/science.1061967. PMID 11567137.
- ^ Time Magazine's article about West
- ^ World Knowledge Dialogue
External links [edit]
- Geoffrey West's Profile at the Santa Fe Institute
- "Yeah, but what about the crayfish?" - Article about West's scaling law work on PhysicsWorld.com
- Scaling Laws In Biology And Other Complex Systems - Talk he gave at Google
- The surprising math of cities and corporations - TED Talk
- "New York Times" article about West's work on biological scaling
- New York Times article about West's work on cities
- "Dr. West's work on the origin of biological scaling laws featured on PBS NOVA
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