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128th Statistical Mechanics Conference
19 May 2025
(中文版原文連結)
(Translated from the Mandarin version with the help of GPT-4o)
It’s been nearly five or six years since I started mingling with physicists. I still remember how, in the early days, reading physics papers felt like trying to see through fogged glass—I often couldn’t grasp the narrative logic or structure, and I was frequently confused by the very different styles of mathematical symbols and how the formulas were used. These days, however, attending physics department talks or reading textbooks and papers feels as comfortable and enjoyable as reading math—almost a form of relaxation. I’ve even started getting comments from old CS friends saying my thinking and writing are becoming “too physics-like.” But there’s still one thing I hadn’t done until now: attending a physics academic conference.
Unlike in CS, where conferences are the main venue for academic publishing, the physics community primarily publishes through journals. That means there’s less pressure to attend conferences regularly unless you’re invited or want to promote your work. This time, however, my advisor was giving a talk at a statistical mechanics conference held at nearby Rutgers University. Since it was just a train ride away, and the conference was small (offering more chances for in-depth interactions), I decided to tag along for what became my very first physics academic meeting.
When I first saw on the conference website that it was the “128th meeting,” I thought it had been running for over a century. Later I found out it’s held twice a year—so it’s been going on for 64 years, still making it probably the longest-running conference I’ve ever attended (even top theoretical CS conferences like STOC and FOCS are only around 50–60 years old). Most impressive of all: this 128-time conference has been organized continuously since the first one by the same professor, Joel Lebowitz. Seeing him sitting in the front row of the lecture hall, attentively listening to each talk with his hearing aids on, was genuinely moving—a testament to his enduring academic passion.
This year’s conference honored three senior scholars: David Nelson, Stefano Olla, and Sara Solla. Each has made foundational and pioneering contributions in very different areas (condensed matter/biophysics, mathematical physics, theoretical/computational neuroscience), all through the lens of statistical mechanics. Over the three-day conference, every speaker was someone influenced by one of them—former collaborators, past students, etc. Because the honorees came from such different fields, the talks naturally clustered into three distinct groups. After a 25-minute talk about rat brain research, you might suddenly hear a story about discovering quasicrystals—like moving through a sauna, cold plunge, and steam room in sequence. Pure bliss.
Interestingly, it wasn’t just the topics that differed—the presentation styles and energy of the speakers also clearly fell into three groups. Most of the time, you could guess a speaker’s field just by hearing a few sentences. This reminded me of a conversation a few weeks ago with my friend J, about the difficulties of interdisciplinary research. We both agreed: the hardest part is learning the “culture” of different fields—the way people interact, communicate, and what they expect from each other. Compared to that, the domain-specific knowledge is relatively easy to acquire.
This cultural distinction was particularly evident during the laudation sessions—arguably the emotional highlight of the conference—which celebrated the three honorees in very different ways.
David Nelson’s laudation was given by his famous student Subir Sachdev, who delivered what could only be described as a dreamlike career retrospective. He went through Nelson’s seminal contributions from his student days onward—each paper founding a subfield, each theory later confirmed by experiment. Nelson has trained countless students, all of whom spoke glowingly of his mentorship—his deep knowledge, his rigor, and his uncanny ability to spot new problems. One student remarked that, now that she advises students of her own, she often wonders how David would guide them. That, to me, is one of the highest compliments you can give a mentor. The final slide—a five-generation academic “family photo”—nearly brought tears to my eyes.
Stefano Olla’s laudation, delivered by a longtime collaborator, focused on several of Olla’s most important papers. What stood out was the time devoted to explaining formal mathematical definitions and theorems in detail. I eventually couldn’t keep up, but the speaker’s sincerity and love for their field shone through. At the end, the presenter wanted to describe Olla’s character outside of his research. After a few seconds of thought, he gave what might be the most “mathematical” compliment I’ve ever heard: “Stefano is a good person.”
Sara Solla’s session, by contrast, felt like it took place in an entirely different world. Five or six computational neuroscientists acted out skits to portray symptoms of different psychiatric disorders, using them to narrate Solla’s various research phases. They also spoke about her community-building efforts, especially how her presence and charisma at summer schools influenced generations of computational neuroscientists. Each speaker had their own unique flair—some acted like they were on stage, others read formally from a script, and some delivered heartfelt tributes that felt like love letters. Even within this already interdisciplinary conference, neuroscience proved to be a world of its own, full of diverse subfields and styles.
The Challenges of Interdisciplinary Work?
Ever since I stumbled into interdisciplinary research, I’ve had many new realizations over time. At first, it felt like being in a buffet—constantly drawn in by the novelty and variety of different problems. As I accumulated more knowledge, I began to appreciate how the way we ask and answer questions can vary drastically between fields, leading to a deeper admiration for truly innovative work in each domain. Once I started doing research at the frontiers and had to explain it to experts from different backgrounds, I finally understood the importance of cultural literacy. Even if a project blends A, B, and C disciplines, when it comes time to write or present, you must adapt to your audience—not just present it in what you think is the “best” way.
In interdisciplinary research, it’s nearly impossible to fully address all A, B, and C fields simultaneously. After all, very few readers are fluent in all of them. At some point, you may have to choose—perhaps focusing on connecting just A and B. This made me think of immigrants and international students: learning multiple languages isn’t the hardest part. The real challenge lies in the identity struggles that arise from navigating between cultural worlds—those quiet moments of doubt that creep in at night.
Now that I’m no longer a student, I’ve started to appreciate the freedom I had to explore back then. As I settle into the cocoon stage of a postdoc—where exploration starts giving way to professional crystallization—I find myself enjoying research more deeply, taking on more responsibilities, but also beginning to ask: what kind of identity do I want to define for my future?