Rob Leigh

Rob Leigh is a Professor of Physics at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, affiliated with the Grainger College of Engineering. His research focuses on theoretical high-energy physics, string theory, and holography. He holds a PhD from the University of Texas at Austin (1991) and has held postdoctoral positions at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and Rutgers University.

Leigh's research interests include D-branes, superstring duality, gauge/gravity dualities, and applications of holography to condensed matter systems. His work has contributed to foundational aspects of string theory, including the discovery of D-branes and the Dirac-Born-Infeld action. He has also explored entanglement entropy in Chern-Simons theory and topological phases of matter.

Leigh has been recognized with awards such as the APS Fellowship (2007), Arnold O. Beckman Award (2004), and DOE Outstanding Junior Investigator (1997–2000). He teaches advanced courses in quantum mechanics and field theory, consistently earning student excellence ratings.