Dr. Giddings is a researcher and professor at the University of California at Santa Barbara, specializing in theoretical physics. His current research includes investigating the quantum nature of spacetime, and what happens to information that is sent into black holes.

He studied mathematics and physics at the University of Utah, and then went to Princeton to earn a Ph.D. under Ed Witten, one of the leaders in superstring theory. His primary research efforts currently include exploring how quantum laws modify the structure of space and time, and the closely related problem of the fate of information cast into black holes. Giddings’ fields of focus include elementary particle theory and quantum gravity, black holes, and cosmology. He is one of the founders of the “landscape” picture of string vacua, and is an expert on the quantum properties of black holes.