Tsvi Tlusty
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Tsvi Tlusty is a theoretical physicist and distinguished professor of physics at the Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology (UNIST). His work concerns how information and function take physical form in living matter, from molecular codes and protein mechanics to collective dynamics far from equilibrium.[1][2]
Career
[edit]Tlusty studied physics and mathematics at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and received his master's degree and doctorate in physics from the Weizmann Institute of Science. After a fellowship at the Center for Studies in Physics and Biology at Rockefeller University, he returned to Weizmann as a senior researcher in the Department of Physics of Complex Systems. From 2011 to 2015, he was a member of the School of Natural Sciences at the Institute for Advanced Study. He joined UNIST in 2015.[1][2]
Research
[edit]His early work used information theory to treat biological codes as noisy channels. In a model of the genetic code, selection induces a transition from random to structured coding, while the topology of probable recognition errors constrains the number and arrangement of encoded meanings.[3][4]
With Yonatan Savir, he introduced conformational proofreading, a mechanism of molecular recognition in which a controlled structural mismatch can sharpen discrimination among similar targets. They later applied the same principle to ribosomal decoding.[5][6]
With Albert J. Libchaber and Jean-Pierre Eckmann, he developed a mechanical model of the protein genotype-to-phenotype map. In this view, proteins are evolvable amorphous matter, with function organized around soft, cooperative modes that transmit motion across the structure.[7]
Later work connected this mechanical picture to catalysis. Experiments and theory showed that enzymes behave as viscoelastic catalytic machines: mutations in regions of high mechanical strain, including sites remote from the active site, altered both their mechanical response and catalytic activity.[8]
In nonequilibrium physics, he and his collaborators identified long-lived quasiparticles and flat-band modes in a classical two-dimensional hydrodynamic system, using concepts usually associated with quantum matter to describe dissipative many-body dynamics.[9]
With Eckmann, he showed that almost every walk in the rotation groups SO(3) or SU(2) returns preferentially to its origin when the rotations are uniformly scaled and the walk is traversed twice. The result followed earlier work on trajectoids, bodies shaped to roll along prescribed paths.[10][11]
References
[edit]- 1 2 "Tlusty Tsvi". Department of Physics, Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology. Retrieved 30 July 2026.
- 1 2 "Tsvi Tlusty". Institute for Advanced Study. Retrieved 30 July 2026.
- ↑ Tlusty, Tsvi (2008). "Casting polymer nets to optimize noisy molecular codes". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 105 (24): 8238–8243. doi:10.1073/pnas.0710274105.
- ↑ Eckmann, Jean-Pierre (17 June 2008). "Trading codes for errors". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 105 (24): 8165–8166. doi:10.1073/pnas.0803931105. ISSN 0027-8424. PMC 2448807. PMID 18559864.
- ↑ Savir, Yonatan; Tlusty, Tsvi (2013). "The ribosome as an optimal decoder: A lesson in molecular recognition". Cell. 153 (2): 471–479. doi:10.1016/j.cell.2013.03.032.
- ↑ Alon, Uri (2008). "Journal club". Nature. 453 (7196): 701–701. doi:10.1038/453701e. ISSN 0028-0836.
- ↑ Eckmann, Jean-Pierre; Rougemont, Jacques; Tlusty, Tsvi (2019). "Colloquium: Proteins: The physics of amorphous evolving matter". Reviews of Modern Physics. 91 (3) 031001. doi:10.1103/RevModPhys.91.031001.
- ↑ Tang, Qian-Yuan (2025). "The mechanics of protein sweet spots". Nature Physics. 21: 695–696. doi:10.1038/s41567-025-02826-8.
- ↑ "Quasiparticles appear in a classical setting, surprising physicists". Physics World. 23 February 2023. Retrieved 30 July 2026.
- ↑ Eckmann, Jean-Pierre; Tlusty, Tsvi (2025). "Walks in rotation spaces return home when doubled and scaled". Physical Review Letters. 135 (14) 147201. doi:10.1103/xk8y-hycn. PMID 41110096.
- ↑ "Mathematicians have found a hidden 'reset button' for undoing rotation". New Scientist. 16 October 2025. Retrieved 30 July 2026.