Jeremy England

Also known as Jeremy L. England

Jeremy England is a physicist and ordained rabbi who applies statistical physics to the way matter organizes itself, and who moved into artificial intelligence and machine learning at GlaxoSmithKline in 2019. After a biochemistry degree at Harvard, he studied at Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar and completed a physics PhD at Stanford in 2009. As an MIT physics professor from 2011 to 2019, he proposed dissipation-driven adaptation, the idea that driven groups of atoms restructure themselves to dissipate more energy, and he brought it to general readers in Every Life Is on Fire in 2020. In 2020, he also coauthored a study that used representation learning to measure how many-body systems learn, and GSK promoted him to vice president in 2023. Since leaving GSK in February 2025, he is the founder of Conquest Labs, and he lives in Modiin, Israel.

Now at: Conquest Labs
Born: 1982
Badges: Founder
Bridge

Years link to their sources.

Timeline

2003–2009

Harvard, Oxford and Stanford

He earns a bachelor's degree in biochemistry at Harvard in 2003 and studies at St John's College, Oxford, from 2003 to 2005 as a Rhodes Scholar. He completes a physics PhD at Stanford in 2009 under Vijay S. Pande, with support from a Hertz Fellowship.
2011–2019

Physics professor at MIT

He joins MIT's Department of Physics as an assistant professor in 2011, and from 2017 he is the Thomas D. and Virginia W. Cabot career development associate professor of physics. Until 2019, his research group studies the nonequilibrium statistical mechanics of life-like self-organization.
2013–2017

Dissipation-driven adaptation

In 2013, he proposes a theory that casts the origin of life as an outcome of thermodynamics: a group of atoms driven by an outside energy source and surrounded by a heat bath will often restructure itself to dissipate more energy. He calls the effect dissipation-driven adaptation, and computer simulations he publishes in PNAS and Physical Review Letters in 2017 appear to support it.
2019–2025

AI and machine learning at GSK

In 2019, he leaves MIT to join GlaxoSmithKline as a senior director in artificial intelligence and machine learning, and GSK promotes him to vice president in 2023. Alongside, he is a principal research scientist in Georgia Tech's Department of Physics from 2020 to 2023, then a visiting professor of physics at Bar-Ilan University.
April 2020

Representation learning for many-body systems

In April 2020, he and four coauthors, including Nicole Yunger Halpern, post "Learning about learning by many-body systems". The paper uses representation learning, a machine-learning model that squeezes information through a bottleneck, to measure how systems such as a classical spin glass learn patterns in their drives; Scientific Reports publishes it in 2021.
September 2020

Every Life Is on Fire

Basic Books publishes his book Every Life Is on Fire in September 2020. In it, he argues that the laws of thermodynamics explain how the first living systems assembled, and he draws on his training as an ordained rabbi to ask whether science helps people find purpose.
2021

The Irwin Oppenheim Award

He shares the American Physical Society's 2021 Irwin Oppenheim Award with Sumantra Sarkar of Los Alamos National Laboratory. The prize honours their theory of how self-replication emerges in simple chemical models, published in Physical Review E in 2019.
Since February 2025

Founding Conquest Labs

In February 2025, he leaves GSK to found Conquest Labs. By September 2025, he lives in Modiin, Israel, and is the company's founder.

Career

Since 2025Conquest LabsFounder
2020–2023Georgia Institute of TechnologyPrincipal research scientist
2019–2025GlaxoSmithKlineSenior director in artificial intelligence and machine learning, Vice president
2011–2019Massachusetts Institute of TechnologyAssistant professor, Thomas D. and Virginia W. Cabot career development associate professor of physics
Bar-Ilan UniversityVisiting professor of physics