UTFA was sad to receive the communication below forwarded from the Chair of the Department of Physics, Dr. Kimberly Strong. We mourn the loss of our colleague, an active member of UTFA Council and several committees over the last few years.
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Dear Physics community,
I am deeply saddened to inform you that Professor Anton Zilman passed away earlier this week. He had been unwell recently, but we had been hoping for a return to full health. His passing was unexpected and has happened far too soon.
Anton joined the Department of Physics as an Assistant Professor in 2011, followed by promotion to Associate Professor in 2017 and to Professor in 2023. He earned his PhD from the Weizmann Institute of Science in 2004 and held postdoctoral fellowships at Rockefeller University (2004-2006) and in the Theoretical Division at Los Alamos National Laboratory (2007-2010) prior to coming to UofT.
Anton was a theoretical and computational biological physicist whose research spanned physics, biology, and biomedical engineering. He had collaborations with a wide network of local, national, and international colleagues, including experimentalists in biology, bio-engineering, nanoscience, and clinical science. He was widely known and highly respected for his work investigating the physical principles of biological transport and signaling processes on the molecular, cellular and population levels, and leveraging these principles for bioengineering and biomedical applications and method development.
Anton was a valued member of our Biological Physics research cluster and had an active and productive research group. He also taught many undergraduate and graduate students over the past 13 years, and was fully engaged in the life of our Department, as well as serving as UTFA Council Member for Physics, Astronomy and Astrophysics since 2020. His sudden passing is a great loss.
Anton's family is taking him to Israel for a funeral on Friday that will be streamed. I expect to receive details early this coming week and will share them with you. I will also try to find out how we may best share condolences with his family.
If anyone would like support at this difficult time, students can access U of T Telus Health Student Support<https://mentalhealth.utoronto.ca/telus-health-student-support/> (1-844-451-9700) and and faculty and staff can access the Employee and Family Assistance Program<https://people.utoronto.ca/employees/efap/> (1-855-597-2110). More resources can be found at https://www.physics.utoronto.ca/physics-at-uoft/general-resources-physics/.
In sadness,
Kim
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Dr. Kimberly Strong, FRSC (she/her)
Professor and Chair
Department of Physics, University of Toronto
MP323, 60 St. George Street, Toronto, ON, M5S 1A7, Canada
416-978-5205 | chair@physics.utoronto.ca
www.physics.utoronto.ca