Twenty-one years cannot be captured in a single interview.
Fortunately, they don’t have to be.
Before diving into the conversation that follows, we invite you to explore two remarkable tributes created in honor of Dean Yannis C. Yortsos‘ tenure as dean of the USC Viterbi School of Engineering.
USC Viterbi Professor Salman Avestimehr and his company, Teamily AI, have created an interactive digital tribute that chronicles the extraordinary breadth of Dean Yortsos’ impact.
USC Viterbi’s Sudha Kumar, director of alumni and constituent relations in India, has assembled a beautiful digital commemorative book filled with photographs, milestones, memories and reflections from across the global Trojan Family.
Here follows the interview, as told to Adam Smith.
Jump to a section:
[1. A Mother’s Wish](#motherswish)
[2. Unforgettable Meetings](#unforgettable)
[3. Genesis of the Grand Challenge Scholars Program](#GCSP)
[4. Small Victories](#smallvictories)
[5. Growing Pains](#growingpains)
[6. Hardest Decisions](#hardestdecisions)
[7. Hugging Things (Exponentially, That Is)](#hugging)
[8. Missing](#missing)
[9. The Joys of No Electricity](#joys)
[10. A New Soccer Jersey](#soccer)
[11. Advice?](#advice)
[12. What’s Next](#whatsnext)
[13. Favorite Books, Shows, Music](#Favoritebooks)
[14. To the White House!](#WhiteHouse)
[15. Champions and Culture Changers](#champions)
[16. The Age of AI](#ageofAI)
[17. On Hiring](#hiring)
[18. What USC Means](#whatUSCmeans)
[19. Creativity Vs. Innovation](#creativity)
[20. Fractal Pyramids](#fractals)
[21. When the Door Closes…](#door)
[Bonus: What Makes Yannis Laugh?](#laugh)
[Extra Bonus: Musings on Philanthropy](#philanthropy)
A Mother’s Wish #
1) You recently revealed it was your late mother’s fondest wish for you to become a bishop and your brother to become town mayor. Let us lean into the multiverse for a moment: what’s the story behind this wish and how close did it come to happening?
Yannis Yortsos: To understand that wish, you have to understand my mother’s life.
She lost her father when she was 14, just after the Second World War. My grandfather had been the mayor of the city of Kalamata and was killed during a vicious civil war that engulfed Greece as the German troops retreated at the end of the Second World War.
I never met him.
My mother’s family endured another tragedy when her older brother also disappeared during the same civil war. Abducted when he was about twenty years old, we never learned what became of him.
Those experiences shaped her deeply. She became very religious, and viewed life significantly through that lens.
She wanted her children to serve others.
I was the older son, and she imagined I should become a bishop. And her wish for my younger brother was to become a mayor!
Neither came close to happening.
(Laughs.) There was one episode that probably encouraged her hopes. My brother and I loved playing soccer, but at those times of our childhood, we each owned only one pair of shoes. Playing soccer ruined them, so my mother was not happy about us playing.
One afternoon, following a local soccer game in the neighborhood streets, we came home sweaty, dusty… and obviously guilty.
“Were you playing soccer again?” she asked.
“No.”
It wasn’t a particularly convincing lie.
So, we negotiated a deal. Instead of being punished, we agreed to become altar boys.
We spent the next many years serving in the Greek Orthodox Church.
Looking back, it was actually a wonderful experience. I learned the liturgy, the traditions and the rhythms of the church. Even today, when I attend a Greek Orthodox service, everything is so familiar.
When I left Rhodes to attend the National Technical University in Athens, my mother gave me a gold cross to wear.
I have worn it ever since.
Unforgettable Meetings #
2) You’ve probably had over 20,000 meetings in this room (Dean’s office – Olin Hall 200). Tell me about one or two that you’re unlikely to forget.
** Yannis Yortsos: **There is one meeting that changed the course of my life.
It was late May 2005.
Then dean of engineering (2001-2005) Max Nikias had just been appointed as provost. A few days before assuming that office, he called Randy Hall and me — the two senior associate deans at the time — into the dean’s office and told us that one of us would become interim dean. It was a Friday, and the decision had to be made before the following Monday.
At the time, I had absolutely no ambition to become dean. None.
Max sort of knew this, while he also understood that I was much involved with my children’s sports (read: soccer!) and other extra-curricular activities. So, I was not surprised when the next morning, around 8:30 am, he called me with the suggestion that Randy may be more interested to serve in that capacity.
I told him I was perfectly happy with such a decision. In fact, I suspect my wife breathed a sigh of relief!
A few hours later, I was driving with my daughter, Kate, to her club soccer tournament in Palmdale, when my phone rang again.
It was Max.
He had spoken with Randy, who elected not to be considered for the interim position. (Randy subsequently served as USC vice provost and vice president for research for about 15 years — likely a university record in that position.)
“Would you be willing to do it?” Max asked.
I said yes.
That second phone call changed everything.
What I remember just as vividly were people’s reactions afterward.
Some colleagues were openly skeptical. One high-level administrator looked at me and essentially said, “Oh, no.”
Another person told me, “You’ve got very big shoes to fill.”
I do remember bringing a photograph of oversized Nike shoes to my first Board of Councilors meeting in recognition of that comment!
Soon after, we started a campaign in celebration of the 100 years of engineering at USC, which was founded in 1905. I decided to use a binary system for 100. The large banner we created in Archimedes Plaza read: Celebrating 1100100 years of Engineering! The casual observer was perplexed. But not Andy Viterbi, who told me immediately that he got the point!
Sometimes humor is the best way to respond to expectations.
Another meeting I remember for a very different reason involved a faculty candidate I chose not to hire during my interim period. I had made a personal rule that I wouldn’t make major faculty appointments because I didn’t want anyone to think I was using the position to strengthen my potential candidacy after the end of the interim period.
Years later, that candidate became a member of the National Academy of Engineering.
That one still makes me smile—and wince—a little.
Not every decision turns out the way you expect.
Genesis of the Grand Challenge Scholars Program #
3) Let’s talk about the Grand Challenges Scholars Program (GCSP). What was the inciting incident? How did it go from an idea to something global that is now endowed in your name?
Yannis Yortsos: The Grand Challenges Scholars Program really began with three people: Tom Katsouleas, who was dean at Duke; Rick Miller, who was president of Olin College; and me. But I should also add Louise Yates, who, as USC Viterbi associate dean for students, became instrumental the first few years in implementing it.
Around the time I joined the National Academy of Engineering (2008), I became interested in the academy’s Grand Challenges initiative and started asking a different question.
What if engineering education itself were organized around solving humanity’s greatest challenges?
Not just teaching technical skills—but connecting those skills to purpose.
We held meetings (particularly one in March 2009 at Duke University), developed the framework together, and introduced the program in April 2009.
It spread much more quickly than any of us anticipated.
Over time, Tom became a provost. Rick was already president of Olin College. As I remained effectively the most closely involved in developing the program, I naturally became its principal steward.
What matters to me isn’t that the program at USC now bears my name today. What matters is what it has done for engineering education.
Engineering is changing its face.
The engineer of the future still needs deep technical knowledge, but increasingly that knowledge must be combined with entrepreneurship, public engagement, multidisciplinary collaboration, global awareness and a commitment to solving problems that matter.
That’s what the Grand Challenges Scholars Program represents.
Actually, I’ve often thought that it should extend beyond engineering. Indeed, every discipline could define its own “grand challenges” and organize an education program around them. In this way, universities have an opportunity to become much more purpose-driven than they traditionally have been.
I have proposed it for our university, and I still hold hope that it will happen.
Small Victories #
4) A lot of people know about your big accomplishments (five named departments, gender parity achieved, USC Stevens naming, etc.). What are some smaller victories, maybe less heralded wins you’re really proud of?
Yannis Yortsos: Helping other people succeed.
That’s really the answer.
If a faculty member wins an award, is elected as a fellow of a professional society or even as member of the National Academies, or a student lands a great position, or our faculty and students make a notable discovery in science or advance the technology, that’s the real win. Naming things is good because it enables future versions of those moments — but the naming itself isn’t the accomplishment. The impact on the people who benefit is the accomplishment.
One story that captures this involves the [USC Rocket Propulsion Laboratory (RPL)](https://www.uscrpl.com/).
Its leader in 2014, Jordan Noone (B.S. ’14), who along with Tim Ellis (B.S. ’12, M.S. ’13), went on to co-found Relativity Space, came to my office, and he basically said:
“We have an idea, we want to go to space; give us seed money to make this happen.”
He asked for $50,000. I was skeptical, but after some thinking, I said yes.
They RPL team built a rocket and launched it — it went up about a thousand feet and then completely melted and fell unceremoniously to the ground. The problem was that heat was generated faster than it could be dissipated through the rocket.
Undaunted, Jordan came back a few months later. He explained that he understood exactly why they had failed.
But now, they would redesign the vehicle, changing the materials to conduct heat away faster.
They wanted another chance. At the same amount of $50,000.
I can’t say I really believed him.
But I admired the tenacity and the perseverance, characteristic of all entrepreneurs. So, I agreed to fund them yet again! But for the last time!
The second launch was a tremendous success.
Jordan and Tim later founded Relativity Space. Years afterward they called again—not asking for a grant this time but asking USC Viterbi to invest in the company. The ask? $50,000! Which we did!
Watching students grow from ambitious dreamers into entrepreneurs and industry leaders—that’s enormously satisfying.
I should mention that during these many years, we had on average at least one member of our faculty elected into the NAE.
These and so many similar successes of our faculty and students are the victories that stay with you.
Growing Pains #
- You don’t go to school to learn how to be dean. I imagine there was some growing pains in the early years. What do you remember?
Yannis Yortsos: The biggest adjustment was realizing that leadership is almost entirely about people.
As a faculty member, you’re trained to solve technical problems.
As dean, you’re solving human ones. And you are trying to inspire towards making a difference.
You spend your days working with faculty, students, alumni, trustees, university leaders—people with different priorities, different personalities, and different perspectives.
Very early on, I decided I would begin by assuming good intentions.
When someone walks into my office with an idea, my first reaction is not what potential hidden agenda they might have. Rather, I assume it is an idea worth considering.
Then, we examine whether it makes sense.
Sometimes people are wrong.
Sometimes ideas don’t work. And sometimes there is a hidden agenda. This will become apparent sooner or later.
But I always begin with trust.
That philosophy shaped almost every decision I made over the past twenty-one years.
Hardest Decisions #
- Tell me about one of the hardest decisions you made as dean. What did you learn?
Yannis Yortsos: It’s interesting—I don’t actually think of most decisions as being particularly hard.
People often imagine a dean spending every day making impossible choices, but that wasn’t my experience.
Most problems have solutions.
In fact, I espouse quantum physicist David Deutsch’s position that problems are inevitable, but that all problems are solvable.
Sometimes they require compromise. Sometimes they require patience. Sometimes they require explaining why something can’t happen today. Most often, they require careful or ingenious thinking. But I have always believed that nearly every problem can be solved if you’re willing to work at it.
Now, there were certainly disappointments.
Faculty members we didn’t hire who later became stars elsewhere. Faculty we recruited who eventually left for other places. You never enjoy seeing outstanding colleagues leave, but if they’re leaving for extraordinary opportunities, well, that’s part of academic life.
The one period that truly felt different — and challenged my belief — was this past year.
Having to restructure the organization was painful. Those weren’t abstract budget decisions. They affected people I knew personally.
That was probably the only time I felt I was making decisions that conflicted with my own instincts.
Hugging Things (Exponentially, That Is) #
7) You’re always exhorting the USC Viterbi School to “ hug the exponential.” How do you, Yannis Yortsos, personally hug the exponential?
Yannis Yortsos: You have to reinvent yourself constantly.
During the academic year, you have very little time to take retreats and think strategically over many issues.
You’re moving from meeting to meeting, solving immediate problems, making decisions, responding to crises.
Summer has always been different for me. People assumed summer is vacation.
In reality, it was my busiest intellectual season.
That’s when I tried to understand what had been accumulating in my mind throughout the year.
Ideas rarely arrive fully formed. You read something. You hear a talk. You have a conversation.
Months later, while you’re walking or exercising, those pieces suddenly connect. You don’t need two months in the Himalayas. Even a week helps.
That’s how new ideas emerge.
Missing #
8) What are some of the things you’ll miss the most as dean of the USC Viterbi School of Engineering?
Yannis Yortsos: Helping people build something new.
That’s the part I’ll miss the most.
Sometimes that meant helping a faculty member launch an ambitious research initiative. Sometimes it meant helping students pursue an idea that seemed impossible. Sometimes it meant opening a door that otherwise would have remained closed.
But what always gave me the greatest satisfaction was watching someone in the school (faculty, students, alumni, staff) succeed. We rejoiced in such accomplishments.
The Joys of No Electricity #
9) Growing up, I believe you had a summer house in the Greek islands with no electricity, no refrigerator. And yet, you became the leader of one of the leading technology schools in the world. What did those early days teach you?
Yannis Yortsos: Those summers taught me that comfort is not happiness.
Our summer house, a few kilometers outside the city of Rhodes, was very simple. We carried furniture from our house in town. And back then, we did not have a refrigerator. A man came every morning, delivering large blocks of ice, which we put inside the proverbial icebox.
For the first few days after we arrived for summer, electricity had not been connected yet. In the evenings we relied on kerosene lamps or candles.
To me, that wasn’t deprivation. That was simply a different, but still exciting life.
We spent our days outdoors.
We had chickens.
We irrigated trees from a well.
But the beach to the Aegean Sea was only a short walk away. It was a wonderful childhood.
Perhaps that’s why I’ve never been particularly impressed by technology for its own sake.
Technology matters because it improves people’s lives. But the point isn’t to have more technology. The point is to create a better life.
That’s a distinction that’s sometimes easy to forget.
A New Soccer Jersey #
10) You were given a #21 USC soccer jersey and ball. Will you be playing any games in your 58-and-older league (maybe against Rod Stewart) wearing that jersey? Also, as a side note, as a mathematician, what does the #21 signify to you?
Yannis Yortsos: (Laughs.) No.
Our league already has uniforms. Every year they’re sponsored by somebody different.
So I don’t think you’ll see me wearing the USC jersey on the field.
As for the number 21…
I am truly thankful to the USC women’s soccer team and coach Jane Alukonis, for their wonderful gesture, with 21 representing the number of years I served as dean!
Regarding its relevance, most of the traditional soccer jersey numbers typically go up to 16. As a forward at the Caltech graduate soccer team I had the traditional center forward number 9. Now, that I’m mostly playing defense in my league, the relevant numbers are 2 or 3. But as the sport changes, we see higher numbers — the World Cup is a classical example.
Advice? #
11) What advice do you have for your successor as dean? Or lacking that, for the USC Viterbi faculty and staff?
** Yannis Yortsos:** My most important advice to myself — which I intend to follow closely — is not to give unsolicited advice!
(Laughs.) Every leader deserves the opportunity to lead in their own way. Len Silverman (dean from 1984 to 2001) never told me what to do. Max Nikias (dean from 2001 to 2005) interacted with me in the same way as he did with other deans, in his capacity as provost. And he gave me advice when I asked.
I intend to follow the same, but if asked, I will try to help with all my ability. Our interim dean Gaurav Sukhatme has all the experience and skills, having served in the dean’s office for nine years and as director of the USC Stevens School the last two, to do a great job.
What’s Next #
12) You always asked our team: “What’s new? What’s next?” Time to answer your own question.
Yannis Yortsos: That’s exactly the question I’ve been asking myself.
For the first time in more than two decades, I don’t have an administrative calendar driving every day. The university has been generous in giving me a year to think before taking on new responsibilities, and I intend to use that time well.
Higher education is entering a period of extraordinary disruption. Artificial intelligence is only one part of it. The economics of universities are changing. How society values higher education is changing.
I don’t yet know exactly where I’ll contribute, whether inside USC or beyond it, but I’d like to help shape that conversation. If I believe that all problems are solvable, then maybe we should select a difficult one and see if the above is really a truism!
There are also scientific ideas I’d like to return to.
During COVID, for example, I became fascinated by mathematical models of infectious disease.
I realized that epidemics could be viewed almost like chemical reaction systems, with susceptible, infected, and recovered populations behaving analogously to reacting chemical species.
Working with colleagues (Professor Assad Oberai) and students, we developed that framework and published several papers, essentially on a topic of public health. Our medical colleagues appreciated the results, although they did mention that there was too much math in the papers!
I enjoyed returning to research in that way.
I certainly will continue being the editor-in-chief of PNAS Nexus, the new multidisciplinary journal of the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine.
Favorite Books, Shows, Music #
13) What are some books, movies, TV shows or music that have meant a lot to you?
Yannis Yortsos: Growing up, I read everything Jules Verne wrote. Those books transported you to another world.
They sparked your imagination and made the impossible seem plausible. They were tremendously influential.
Two in particular stand out. “Around the World in Eighty Days” fascinated me because it revealed the world’s geography and cultures at a time when global travel still felt like an extraordinary adventure. “From the Earth to the Moon” was remarkable because it anticipated space travel decades before it became reality.
Verne had this extraordinary ability to imagine the future while making it feel completely believable.
I read fiction when I can — Jonathan Franzen, John le Carré especially. I’ve read almost everything le Carré wrote; I love anything built around a conspiracy or a betrayal, where you spend the whole book wondering whether justice will actually be served.
I do love a good thriller. Give me a small English coastal town, a descending fog, and a murder on the moors…
(laughs) On the non-fiction genre, I’ve been drawn to (Noah Yuval) Harari — not because anything he’s said necessarily surprised me, but because of how he does it: he weaves history forward into genuinely original predictions about the future, in a way I haven’t seen anyone else do quite as well.
One show I’ve genuinely enjoyed recently is “Welcome to Wrexham” — about two Hollywood guys who bought a small Welsh soccer club. It resonates with me because growing up in the city of Rhodes, we also had our own local team, and that team was the heart of civic pride — you see exactly that dynamic play out in the show.
Music has probably been a bigger companion over the years. Leonard Cohen has always appealed to me because of the poetry in his songwriting. Pink Floyd captured the spirit of an entire generation. Madeleine Peyroux is in my music library. And I like many Italian and French songs. I also enjoy classical guitar — Segovia, for example — and classical composers like Sibelius, Smetana and, of course, Mozart.
Mozart is the musical equivalent of medicine for a headache — it just makes things better.
To the White House! #
- On August 4, 2015, you helped lead a national diversity pledge at the White House (signed by more than 100 engineering deans). What do you remember from that day? How did it pave the road for USC Viterbi reaching gender parity in 2019?
Yannis Yortsos: That day really began several years earlier.
In 2011, I became involved with the Engineering Deans Council through the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE). I was asked to assume responsibility for its diversity activities. At first, it was the kind of committee work organizations often do.
But I kept asking myself whether we could accomplish something more meaningful.
In April 2015, I chaired a session at the Engineering Deans Institute meeting in South Carolina to help assess engineering’s progress on diversity. Former USC Professor John Slaughter as well as several women engineering deans participated. By the end of the discussion, the conclusion was unmistakable: despite years of efforts, progress was slow and unremarkable.
Following the session, we engaged with the deans in the room about how to make more notable progress. The Grand Challenges Scholars Program, which we started in 2009, had shown that engineering schools could rally around a shared vision.
Could we do the same for this topic?
A small group began developing a set of concrete goals that engineering schools could adopt. Rather than simply expressing support, we aimed for measurable goals.
The effort was to commence later — at the start of the new academic year. Then something unexpected happened.
In June 2015, I was in Washington D.C. for a meeting on innovation and entrepreneurship when Tom Kalil from the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy approached me.
He had heard about our effort.
“If you can do something meaningful,” he said, “we’ll highlight it at a White House event scheduled later in the summer.”
This changed our timeline!
Within weeks, engineering deans across the country came together behind what ultimately became a Deans’ Diversity Initiative of the ASEE, and on August 4, 2015, it was announced at the White House at its “Inclusive Entrepreneurship” event. President Obama referenced it directly in his remarks — “more than 100 deans have committed to…” — and that public moment did more for momentum than anything we could have done ourselves.
As for how it connects to USC Viterbi specifically reaching gender parity in 2019 — that part, honestly, comes from something separate and more fundamental.
Our vision is that engineering should be framed around solving big societal problems (e.g. through the Grand Challenges lens), rather than as “I’m going to be a chemical engineer and do chemical engineer things.”
When you broaden what engineering means, you organically attract a much wider range of people — including more women. By expanding the definition of the discipline itself, the numbers follow naturally.
Champions and Culture Changers #
15) Name someone—a faculty member, student, staff member—who changed the way you think about this school and your role in it.
Yannis Yortsos: That’s actually a difficult question because it wasn’t one person.
It was many people.
It was many people. USC engineering has changed over the years.
There was a moment at a recent event where Andy Viterbi himself spoke about this.
He said, a bit jokingly, I must admit, that USC had always appointed electrical engineering deans — and then suddenly there was this “new species,” a chemical engineer, as dean.
One person who helped me make that transition work was [Sol Golomb, the legendary USC mathematician and electrical engineering professor]. Sol was the soul of the school. He never had a doubt that I’d do a good job. That mattered to me very much, because he represented the majority thinking.
The support of the USC higher administration, including Presidents Sample, Nikias, Austin, Folt and Kim, has been strong and unequivocal. So has been the support of the USC Viterbi trustees (the late Mal Curie, and Dan Epstein, Ming Hsieh, Ken Klein, John Mork, Stayce Harris and Mark Stevens) and, of course, Andy Viterbi and his late wife, Erna.
I felt a special connection with Erna, as she also grew up in the Eastern Mediterranean, and we shared in many ways a familiar upbringing.
But I must add that in many ways it has been the younger faculty — and especially the women faculty we hired — who have been instrumental in changing the school. They have brought different ways of thinking and created a different momentum. I remember in 2001 there were only three women faculty in engineering. This number is now close to 40.
And the impact is for the better.
The Age of AI #
16) Engineering schools tend to talk about the future but operate like the past. What’s one thing about engineering education that needs to change for the Age of AI?
Yannis Yortsos: At some point very soon, there’s going to be a serious question about the role of humans versus the role of machines in our world. Engineers will be right in the middle of that conversation.
How we make those calls matters a great deal. People already talk about autonomous systems taking over difficult, dangerous work — Si Ramo wrote a book (“Let Robots do the Dying”) around 2011, essentially predicting that warfare would become an autonomous, robotic enterprise.
We’re seeing exactly that play out today.
When you look at AI’s impact on energy use, on climate, on the planet — these are enormous, intersecting issues. I think we’re going to see more and more overlap between human-driven objectives and the technical machinery built to address them.
That’s really where the Grand Challenges framework comes back in — I expect that intersection to define a lot of what’s next.
On Hiring #
17) You’ve hired dozens of faculty, department chairs, and senior leaders over 21 years. What do you look for that doesn’t appear on a CV?
Yannis Yortsos: A CV only shows you the technical accomplishments — it doesn’t show you the human element.
How someone handles adversity. The judgment they show under pressure. None of that’s on paper.
At the same time, one can assess someone’s fitness for the particular job by engaging with conversation, in addition to other standard approaches one follows in such cases. Ultimately, much depends on helping create an environment where good judgment is allowed to surface, as opposed to having people overreact under pressure.
If the latter happens, my first instinct isn’t to write them off — rather it is to find out why. There’s always a reason, and once you understand it, you can bring someone back into the conversation: set the reaction aside and focus on the actual problem in front of you. We certainly had such situations over the years — fortunately, not that many.
What USC Means #
18) You’ve spent nearly 50 years at USC. What does this university mean to you?
Yannis Yortsos: USC gave me freedom.
When I arrived as a young faculty member, no one tried to define exactly what kind of researcher I should become.
My work focused on mathematical modeling of fluids in porous media—water, oil, gas moving underground.
It wasn’t especially experimental, although I did publish some work in that area.
It wasn’t computational in the way many engineering fields have become.
It was theoretical.
USC simply allowed me to pursue those ideas.
That freedom meant everything.
Later, as dean, I came to appreciate something even more important.
USC is one of the few universities where engineering can genuinely collaborate with medicine, business, law, public policy, social work, cinema, the arts, and virtually every other discipline.
Those connections are tremendously valuable.
Creativity Vs. Innovation #
19) A student once asked you a question that briefly stumped you: “What is the difference between innovation and creativity?” How would you answer now?
Yannis Yortsos: I remember exactly where that happened.
I was giving a lecture at a university in Korea.
Just before the talk, I’d happened to read an article in The Economist discussing precisely this distinction.
So I had an answer ready.
My answer: innovation is always tied to financial impact. You can’t really call something innovative if it doesn’t create financial value back. Creativity doesn’t carry that requirement — you can create something beautiful, like a painting, that has zero economic value, and it’s still creative. So that’s the line for me: no economic impact, it’s creativity; economic impact, it’s innovation.
Fractal Pyramids #
20) I’ve got to ask—what’s the deal with the fractal pyramids? What sparked this love affair?
**Yannis Yortsos: **First of all, I’m not entirely sure why they’ve multiplied in the dean’s suite!
(Laughs, staring at the small fractal pyramids on the conference table)
People keep giving them to me.
My fascination with fractals comes from my research.
It goes back to the subsurface work. You see, we’re so conditioned, going back to ancient Greek geometry, to think in circles, straight lines, and translational symmetry. Interestingly, nature — and specifically the subsurface — doesn’t behave that way. It has nested structures — sometimes leading to what is called anomalous diffusion — which do not fit the traditional way we describe the world.
Mountains aren’t pyramids. Coastlines aren’t straight lines. And likewise, for the pore structures in the subsurface. The closer you look, the more structure you find at every scale.
Indeed, a fractal pyramid looks essentially the same whether you examine it from far away or very close.
The structure repeats itself.
I taught a class on fractal geometry here at USC back in 1989, open to students from any major. It was one of the most enjoyable courses I’ve ever taught. It exposed us to a different way of thinking about geometry than what we are typically used to.
Now, what I actually wanted to do — and I’ve been asking my advancement team to find a donor for this for about 15 years — was commission an actual fractal pyramid sculpture for one of our plazas.
Imagine that we will have at the Epstein Plaza a true fractal pyramid with holes at every scale, as opposed, say to the Louvre pyramid! As far as I know, there is no such a pyramid built yet. I think it is time to do it!
When the Door Closes… #
21) When you walk out of OHE 200 for the last time (as dean), what’s the last thing you’ll do before you close the door?
** Yannis Yortsos: **Clearly and literally, I would first have to make sure that all my dean’s detritus over 21+ years, is collected and cleaned for
Gaurav Sukhatme, who graciously accepted to lead the school for the next interim period.
But figuratively, it would be a time of gratitude to the many people who helped the school advance over all these years: first and foremost, Viterbi faculty and staff, the dean’s leadership teams over 21+ years, department chairs and deans colleagues and our many students and alumni.
I will be particularly thankful to Andrew Viterbi and the late Erna Viterbi, the five USC presidents and the six USC provosts I had the privilege of working with, the USC Board of Trustees, and its chair Suzanne Nora Johnson.
But more importantly, my family here in the U.S. — my life partner of 40+ years, Sheryl, and our three children, Chris, Kate and Stevie and their families; and my family in Greece, my late mother and father, and my siblings, who have continuously supported me across the oceans.
Bonus: What Makes Yannis Laugh? #
Many people, including President Kim, have remarked that you’re quite funny, especially when speaking extemporaneously. Where did this come from — were you the funny one in your family growing up? What makes you laugh?
**Yannis Yortsos: **By no means was I “the funny one” growing up!
In my own family, sometimes I will make an esoteric joke, which is immediately tagged as a “dad joke.”
I do believe, though, that people sometimes take situations more seriously than they need to. I’ve often said that almost every problem is solvable. Once you believe that, it’s easier to step back, look at the situation from a different angle, and occasionally find some humor in it.
I think that instinct is fairly characteristic of people from Greece and the Mediterranean more broadly — when you come from a place with that much accumulated history, you tend to look at things with a long lens and a grain of salt. This serves two purposes: it keeps people from getting too consumed by a problem, and it helps you actually solve it without being too rigid or uptight about the process.
What makes me laugh is absurdity — and a particular kind of it: when something looks hopelessly complicated, everyone’s stuck treating it that way, and then someone reveals a genuinely simple answer that was sitting there the whole time.
That moment of “how did I miss that?” — it’s a thing that gets me.
Extra Bonus: Musings on Philanthropy #
During your 21 years as dean, the school raised more than $1.25 billion in philanthropic support. How do you view philanthropy and its impact on the USC Viterbi School?
Yannis Yortsos: As I have mentioned on occasion before, philanthropic support to an academic institution is essentially a statement about faith in humanity.
With the tremendous advancement of technology today, this is more needed than ever before, in our goal to build a better world for all humanity.
It must be stressed that philanthropic support results from the culture and accomplishments of our faculty and students, the culture and environment built in the university, the vision of its leadership, the affection of alumni and constituents and the talent of the advancement team. We have been fortunate to be the recipients of this generosity for many years and we look forward to continuing it for many more to come.
Published on June 29th, 2026
Last updated on July 1st, 2026