Jesse Thaler named director of MIT Laboratory for Nuclear Science

Professor Jesse Thaler has been named director of the MIT Laboratory for Nuclear Science, effective Aug. 1. He succeeds Professor Bolek Wyslouch, who directed LNS for the past decade, and will continue his research in particle physics while taking on leadership of the laboratory.

Who is Jesse Thaler?

Jesse Thaler is a theoretical particle physicist who combines quantum field theory and machine learning; he holds the William and Emma Rogers Professorship of Physics in the MIT Center for Theoretical Physics — a Leinweber Institute. He received his PhD in physics from Harvard University in 2006 and his BS in math/physics from Brown University in 2002, was a Miller Institute fellow from 2006 to 2009, and joined the MIT faculty in 2010.

Thaler has served since 2020 as the inaugural director of the National Science Foundation AI Institute for Artificial Intelligence and Fundamental Interactions, IAIFI, and under his leadership IAIFI created a doctoral program in physics, statistics, and data science with MIT’s Institute for Data, Systems, and Society, as well as dedicated postdoctoral fellowships.

What will he oversee at LNS?

Thaler will lead LNS’s broad portfolio, which traces back to its founding in 1946 and now spans nuclear and particle physics, cosmology, gravity, field theory, and quantum information science. As head of LNS, he will also oversee his home center, the Center for Theoretical Physics — a Leinweber Institute (CTP-LI), which last year received a donation from the Leinweber Foundation to establish a network of theoretical physics research institutes.

The laboratory is positioned to pursue new projects through the Department of Energy’s Genesis Mission, which has a focus on AI-enabled scientific discovery. Within IAIFI, Thaler has emphasized education and cross-disciplinary training; Mike Williams, professor of physics, will succeed Thaler as IAIFI director when Thaler assumes the LNS directorship.

How has Thaler mixed AI and particle physics?

Thaler has built a research program that applies machine learning to core problems in fundamental physics, including pioneering work on particle jets at the Large Hadronic Collider. Nergis Mavalvala, dean of the MIT School of Science, praised his work: "In his research, Jesse has done pioneering work on particle jets at the Large Hadronic Collider and is a leader in combining AI and machine learning with fundamental particle physics."

At IAIFI, Thaler championed initiatives intended to give early-career researchers interdisciplinary freedom, arguing that algorithms developed for collider experiments and theoretical calculations have value beyond particle physics. IAIFI was recently renewed for another five years.

Why it matters

Thaler’s appointment aligns LNS leadership with a researcher who has explicitly built bridges between machine learning and theoretical particle physics, at a moment when LNS is slated to engage DOE Genesis Mission projects that emphasize AI-enabled discovery. The combination of Thaler’s academic background, his record leading IAIFI since 2020, and institutional moves such as the Leinweber Foundation donation signal that LNS intends to deepen its investment in AI tools alongside traditional theory and experiment.

What to watch

Thaler’s directorship takes effect Aug. 1; expect Mike Williams to take over IAIFI leadership soon thereafter. Watch for LNS announcements about specific Genesis Mission projects and for how CTP-LI leverages the Leinweber Foundation donation to expand theoretical networks and interdisciplinary training.