Oliver Penrose

Oliver Penrose
Born (1929-06-06) 6 June 1929
Alma materUniversity College, London
King's College, Cambridge
Known forPenrose criterion
Off-diagonal long-range order
FatherLionel Penrose
RelativesRoger Penrose (brother)
Jonathan Penrose (brother)
Shirley Hodgson (sister)
J. Doyle Penrose (grandfather)
John Beresford Leathes (grandfather)
Antony Penrose (cousin)
AwardsFRS (1987)
Scientific career
FieldsPhysics
InstitutionsImperial College, London
Open University
Heriot-Watt University
Doctoral advisorNeville Temperley
Websitewww.macs.hw.ac.uk/~oliver/

Oliver Penrose FRS FRSE (born 6 June 1929) is a British theoretical physicist and emeritus professor at Heriot-Watt University. His topics of interest include statistical mechanics, phase transitions in metals and the physical chemistry of surfactants. He is known for introducing the concept of off-diagonal long-range order, important to the present understanding of superfluids and superconductors. He is also known for the Penrose criterion in plasma physics.

He was associated with the Open University for seventeen years and was a Professor of Mathematics at Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh from 1986 until his retirement in 1994.

Penrose has worked in fundamental topics, which include understanding the physical basis for the direction of time and interpretations of quantum mechanics.