Origin Story Rewind: Mark Trodden
Ten years ago, Trodden was the subject of our first-ever “Origin Story.” In honor of his new role as Dean of the School of Arts & Sciences, we’re bringing it back.
When he was a student at Cambridge, Mark Trodden (seen here in 2000) participated in a course by famed theoretical physicist and cosmologist Stephen Hawking (front row center).
On June 1, 2025, Mark Trodden began his tenure as Dean of the School of Arts & Sciences and Thomas S. Gates, Jr. Professor of Physics & Astronomy, following two years as the School’s Associate Dean for the Natural Sciences.
Ten years ago this June, he was the subject of Omnia’s first-ever “Origin Story,” a series created to highlight the journeys of members of our faculty on their paths from impressionable young students to world-class scholars. Back then, Trodden was Fay R. and Eugene L. Langberg Professor of Physics, chair of the Department of Physics and Astronomy, and co-director of the Penn Center for Particle Cosmology.
In this short video, he discusses the Big Bang and the unanswered questions about the universe, why he studied mathematics, about the time he overlapped with Stephen Hawking at Cambridge, and much more.
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