page_title: James Kakalios
section_title: Work
hierarchical_section_title: James Kakalios / Work
caption_attribution_description: English: James Kakalios (left) with the University of Lincoln (UK) Chancellor Lord Victor Adebowale (right) after receiving Honorary DSc degree.
context_page_description: James Kakalios is a physics professor at the University of Minnesota. Known within the scientific community for his work with amorphous semiconductors, granular materials, and 1/f noise, he is known to the general public as the author of the book The Physics of Superheroes, which considers comic book superheroes from the standpoint of fundamental physics.
context_section_description: Kakalios, who earned PhD from the University of Chicago in 1985, began his comic book collection as a graduate student as a way to relieve stress. At Minnesota, he taught a freshman seminar that focused on the physics of superheroes as a way to motivate students to think about physics. This course gained great popularity as an enticing alternative to the typical inclined planes and pulleys of physics.
  The seminar was a great success, leading to articles in popular magazines including People, lectures on the subject, and publication of The Physics of Superheroes.  In his talks, favorite examples are the death of Gwen Stacy (Spider-Man's girlfriend), "can Superman jump over tall buildings and what does this tell us about Krypton?", the high-velocity actions of The Flash, and the shrinking problem of the Atom.  His analysis of Gwen Stacy's death eventually became integral to the plot of a new Spider-Man comic.
  Kakalios is of the opinion that the most unrealistic aspect of the comic-book universe is often the sociology.  He notes that pedestrians do not usually provide running monologues describing everything around them.  There is one aspect of the story of the Atom that he does not question, however.  The Atom begins as a physics professor, who encounters a chunk of white dwarf star and picks it up.  "By a conservative estimate, he is lifting about 5000 metric tons.  This is not unreasonable. We physics professors are just that strong."
  He provides content on the DVD of the film Watchmen. Under extras, he is filmed discussing the physics of superheroes. As one of the film's lead scientific consultants of the 2012 film The Amazing Spider-Man, Kakalios designed the film's "decay rate algorithm", which was inspired by the real-life Gompertz–Makeham law of mortality.
  Kakalios has been nominated by the University of Minnesota to be one of the USA Science and Engineering Festival's Nifty Fifty Speakers who will speak about his work and career to middle and high school students in October 2010.
  James Kakalios was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Science degree from the University of Lincoln, UK (2017).
  AAAS Public Engagement with Science Award (2014)
caption: James Kakalios (left) with the University of Lincoln (UK) Chancellor Lord Victor Adebowale (right) after receiving Honorary DSc degree. 7th September 2017, Lincoln, UK.
exif: {"GPS GPSDate": "2017:09:07", "GPS GPSAltitudeRef": "0", "GPS GPSLongitudeRef": "W", "GPS GPSImgDirection": "351", "GPS GPSLongitude": "[0, 32, 52541/2000]", "GPS GPSProcessingMethod": "ASCII", "GPS GPSLatitudeRef": "N", "GPS GPSImgDirectionRef": "M", "GPS GPSTimeStamp": "[14, 47, 43]", "GPS GPSAltitude": "130", "GPS GPSLatitude": "[53, 14, 65803/10000]", "Image GPSInfo": "552", "Image Model": "YotaPhone", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Centered", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ExifOffset": "149", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image Make": "Yota Devices", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "30067", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "897", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2017:09:07 15:47:44", "EXIF ExposureIndex": "284", "EXIF FocalLength": "89/20", "EXIF ApertureValue": "2", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "2448", "EXIF SubSecTime": "057239", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "5321/1000", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2017:09:07 15:47:44", "EXIF SubSecTimeDigitized": "057239", "EXIF GainControl": "High gain up", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "3264", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0220", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "522", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "232", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF SubSecTimeOriginal": "057239", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/40"}