Who is Sabrina Gonzalez Pasterski, the physicist called the next Einstein?

From building and flying her own aircraft before she was old enough to drive to producing research cited by the late Stephen Hawking, Sabrina Gonzalez Pasterski has become one of the most closely watched theoretical physicists of her generation.

Her work on some of the biggest unanswered questions in modern physics, coupled with an unconventional career path and recent appearance at the 2026 Met Gala, has once again placed the Chicago-born scientist in the global spotlight.

Often dubbed the "next Albert Einstein", Pasterski has consistently downplayed the attention.

Yet her contributions to theoretical physics, particularly in understanding the relationship between gravity and quantum mechanics, have earned admiration across the scientific community and beyond.

She has also turned down lucrative career opportunities to continue pursuing fundamental research into what she describes as the universe's underlying structure.

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A childhood shaped by aviation and scientific curiosity

Born in 1993 to a Cuban-American mother and a Polish-American father, Pasterski displayed an interest in flight long before she chose physics as a career. While many children dream of flying an aircraft, she decided to build one.

In an interview with The Times in May earlier this year, Pasterski recalled that physics was not her first ambition.

As a child who grew up listening to the Spice Girls, she initially imagined herself becoming a pop singer. That changed after watching the Harry Potter films, when she told her father she wanted to fly on a broomstick.

Unable to fulfil that request literally, her father introduced her to aviation instead. At the age of nine, her parents bought her flying lessons and a 1972 Cessna 150L aircraft.

They also transformed a spare room in their home by painting it sky blue and suspending cables from the ceiling so she could wear a harness and record videos that created the illusion of flying.

Reflecting on the support she received, Pasterski said, "Because I’m an only child, they put all their resources into me."

Her fascination with aviation only intensified. At the age of 12, she began assembling a Zenith Zodiac CH 601 XL kit aircraft in her family's garage under her father's supervision. Nearly two years later, she completed the project and flew the single-engine plane by herself at 14, years before she was legally eligible to drive.

After finishing the aircraft, she sent Jeff Bezos — already one of her personal heroes — a video showing the engine running, along with a clip in which she joked that she would take him "to Mars".

Bezos personally responded with a letter that included an invitation to visit Blue Origin's headquarters.

"Thank you so much for your letter and video. You’re right that the sub-orbital [space flight] is just a first step for us," the letter read before adding, "We’ll have a job here for you when you’re ready to help us go further!"

Blue Origin subsequently flew Pasterski and her parents to Washington state for a tour of its facilities. Looking back, she described the offer as an extraordinary gesture rather than a formal employment commitment.

"It was just a very kind gesture that really doesn’t have any teeth — I was 14 at the time — but there’s technically an offer letter, so if Bezos ever creates a physics institute, I’ll be like, ‘Yo, I’m going to translate this over,’” she said.

Her interest in aerospace also led to internships at Nasa's Kennedy Space Center and Blue Origin while she was still a student. During her time at the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy, she also competed for a place on the United States International Physics Olympiad team.

Excelling at MIT before making waves at Harvard

Pasterski's academic achievements matched her early engineering accomplishments.

When she first applied to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 2010, she was initially placed on the waitlist. Her homemade aircraft reportedly played an important role in strengthening her application.

She completed her undergraduate degree in physics in only three years, graduating with a perfect 5.0 GPA. In doing so, she became the first woman in roughly two decades to finish at the top of MIT's physics department and also became the first female recipient of the prestigious Orloff Scholarship.

Although she initially envisioned a future in aerospace engineering, she said she eventually chose physics after listening to influential technology entrepreneurs discuss its importance.

She "rebelled" by studying physics, Paterski explained to The Times, noting that the subject appealed to her because of its potential to answer the deepest questions about nature.

She later pursued doctoral research at Harvard University under renowned theoretical physicist Andrew Strominger.

While working with Strominger and Alexander Zhiboedov, Pasterski contributed to pioneering research into the "spin memory effect" — a phenomenon linked to gravitational waves and the structure of spacetime. The work attracted massive attention after Stephen Hawking cited it in some of his final scientific papers on black holes.

Her research explores one of the greatest unresolved challenges in modern science: reconciling Albert Einstein's theory of gravity with quantum mechanics.

This scientific ambition is the primary reason many commentators compare her to Einstein. The comparison is not based on celebrity but on the scale of the problems she is attempting to solve.

Pasterski herself has never claimed she will provide the ultimate solution. Instead, she has repeatedly suggested that physics remains exciting precisely because the next breakthrough is impossible to predict.

Turning down million-dollar offers to pursue fundamental research

Pasterski's academic reputation soon attracted offers that many scientists would consider impossible to refuse.

She reportedly received recruitment interest from Nasa and Blue Origin. After completing a postdoctoral fellowship at the Princeton Center for Theoretical Science, Brown University also offered her an assistant professorship package reportedly worth around $1.1 million, including research funding.

Rather than accept, she chose to join Canada's Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in 2021, becoming one of its youngest research faculty members.

There she established the Celestial Holography Initiative, an international programme focused on understanding the relationship between quantum mechanics, gravity and spacetime.

The initiative later secured an $8 million grant from the Simons Foundation in 2023, bringing together researchers from leading institutions including Harvard University, the University of Oxford, the University of Cambridge and the Institute for Advanced Study.

Her current research seeks what she described in The Times interview as the "source code for the universe", echoing Einstein's own lifelong attempt to formulate a unified theory explaining all fundamental forces.

Beyond theoretical physics, Pasterski has continued pursuing unconventional personal projects. She revealed that she is also attempting to build what she described as a humanoid graduate student using a robot purchased from China.

From blackboards to the Met Gala

Despite spending most of her career immersed in advanced mathematics, Pasterski unexpectedly found herself attending one of the world's highest-profile fashion events in 2026.

She was invited to the Met Gala by Australian packaging billionaire Anthony Pratt after he came across her scientific work online. "He apparently loves physics and loves Einstein," Pasterski said, explaining why Pratt invited her to join his table.

"I wouldn’t have thought in a million years that I’d be there," she added.

Unlike most attendees, who typically spend months preparing their outfits, Pasterski designed and assembled her own 3D-printed dress only hours before the event using aluminium, leather and tulle.

She admitted the process continued until the final moments before she left. "I worked on it up to the minute. I didn’t have time to do my makeup."

The gown was inspired by a mathematical concept known as the Hopf fibration. Using Google's Gemini artificial intelligence programme, she developed the design herself before receiving approval from Anna Wintour's team.

"I don’t want to say that Anna Wintour approved the final look, but she approved of the vision," she said.

Superglue reportedly held parts of the outfit together as she attended the gala, where she met Anna Wintour, Nicole Kidman, Lauren Sánchez Bezos, Google co-founder Sergey Brin and Jeff Bezos.

Meeting Bezos again was particularly significant because he had encouraged her scientific ambitions as a teenager. "I definitely didn’t expect him to remember … but as soon as a few words were said he went back into the conversation," she said.

Although she acknowledged that publicity does little to advance scientific discoveries directly, Pasterski believes greater public visibility could help bridge the gap between technology billionaires and academic research.

She hopes that influential business leaders will increasingly support scientific work through philanthropy. "What Anna Wintour did for fashion, that’d be super cool to try to do that for the sciences and funding," she said.

Even after years of international recognition, Pasterski remains uncomfortable with the attention surrounding her achievements.

She described much of the praise as "undeserved" but believes greater visibility can still serve an important purpose by attracting support for scientific research. "Somehow, being a little bit relevant to get their attention doesn’t hurt."

Today, Sabrina Gonzalez Pasterski continues to focus on answering some of physics' most profound questions. While the label of "the next Einstein" has followed her for nearly a decade, her own emphasis remains firmly on curiosity, discovery and the pursuit of knowledge rather than headlines, celebrity or multimillion-dollar career offers.

With inputs from agencies