Ohio State University

Interview with Rosemary Askin, a New Zealand geologist specializing in Antarctic palynology. The interview begins with Askin recounting her childhood in New Zealand where her father worked as a civil engineer. She discusses her undergraduate studies in geology and zoology at Victoria University of Wellington, where she was introduced to palynology which she decided to pursue for graduate study. Askin discusses how she developed her focus area of Antarctic geology and describes her field work there. She talks about her many areas of research such as fossil pollen and the evolution of spores. Askin also recalls the many challenges of being a woman in geology at the time, especially a woman wanting to work in Antarctica. She discusses her academic appointments over the years at Ohio State University, Colorado School of Mines, and University of California Riverside, as well as her time as a Fulbright scholar. Toward the end of the interview, Askin describes her more recent work establishing the US Polar Rock Repository at Ohio State, and she reflects on the changes she has observed in the field of Antarctic science over the years. 

Interview with Dale Van Harlingen, Professor of Physics at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. He recounts his childhood in Ohio and his undergraduate education at OSU in physics and his early work on SQUIDS. Van Harlingen discusses his mentor Jim Garland, and he explains his decision to stay at OSU for graduate school to develop SQUID devices to make phase-sensitive measurements. He explains the opportunities that gained him a postdoctoral appointment at the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge where he developed his expertise in the Josephson Effect, and where he met John Clarke, who offered him a subsequent postdoctoral position at UC Berkeley. Van Harlingen describes his foray using SQUIDS to push the quantum limit, and he explains his decision to join the faculty at Illinois, where he was impressed both with the quality of the research and how nice everyone was. He describes joining the Materials Research Laboratory and the development of the Micro and Nanotechnology Laboratory, and he conveys his admiration for Tony Leggett. Van Harlingen discusses his research in NMR microscopy, grain boundary junctions, scanning tunneling microscopy, vortex configurations, and he describes his current interest in unconventional superconductors. At the end of the interview, Van Harlingen conveys his excitement about the national quantum initiative as a major collaboration between universities and National Labs, and he explains his motivation to understand if Majorana fermions actually exist.

In this interview, Junko Shigemitsu, Professor Emerita in the Department of Physics at the Ohio State University, surveys the field of lattice gauge theory over the course of her career, and she recounts her childhood moving around the world because her father was a diplomat for Japan’s foreign ministry. She explains the circumstances that led her family back to Japan, and her decision to pursue a degree in physics at Sophia University in Tokyo. Shigemitsu discusses her interest in attending Cornell for graduate school, where she studied under the direction John Kogut. She discusses Ken Wilson’s revolutionary work on renormalization, and her thesis work on QCD. Shigemitsu describes her postdoctoral work at the Institute for Advanced Study at a time when lattice gauge theory was beginning to mature, and she discusses her subsequent postdoctoral position at Brown. She explains that opportunities that led to her faculty position at Ohio State and her subsequent research on QCD at non-zero temperatures. Shigemitsu discusses the international HPQCD collaboration and more recent advances in understanding subatomic particles in partnership with SLAC and KEK in Japan. She places the greatest excitement in finding physics beyond the Standard Model in the period starting in 2009, and she explains the increasing utility of computers as their power has grown over the decades. At the end of the interview, Shigemitsu conveys her excitement that the field will yield new discoveries, perhaps including new physics, and that quantum computing will likely be central to these prospects. 

Interview with Lonnie Thompson, Distinguished University Professor at Ohio State University and Senior Scholar at the Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center. Thompson describes the administrative history of the Byrd Center and he surveys his current field work in ice core drilling and the role of theory in his research. He provides his perspective on how humanity should respond to climate change and why natural climate fluctuations do not explain the current climate situation. Thompson recounts his childhood in West Virginia and the opportunities that allowed him to pursue a degree in physics at Marshall University. He discusses his graduate research at Ohio State in geophysics and geology while serving in the Army Reserves, and he describes how he developed the Byrd Center. Thompson describes his field work in China and Russia and the value of drilling across the planet. He discusses his work with Al Gore on An Inconvenient Truth and he conveys his feelings about winning the National Medal of Science. Thompson describes working with his wife Ellen Mosley-Thompson as his closest collaborator and what he has learned about conveying his scientific findings to the public. He reflects on the meaning of environmental heroism and the remaining field work that needs to be done after nearly 50 years of drilling. At the end of the interview, Thompson describes his current interest in finding and preserving biodiversity and why the next frontier for ice core drilling will be on Mars and beyond.

In this interview, David Zierler, Oral Historian for AIP, Interviews Robert Kuckuck, director emeritus of Los Alamos National Laboratory. He recounts his childhood in Wheeling, West Virginia, and he describes his working-class upbringing and how he would understand pursuing an advanced degree as very much an against-the-grain endeavor relative to his roots. He describes the circumstances leading to his undergraduate education at West Liberty State College and how he settled on physics as a major. Kuckuck discusses his work in the library for Battelle, and the arrangement he made to pursue a graduate degree in physics part time at Ohio State. He describes his work there under the direction of K. Narahari Rao and how he came to work at the Radiation Laboratory at the University of California. Kuckuck explains what he learned about nuclear weapons and research early in his career at Livermore, and how he integrated his lab work in the L-Division with his graduate studies. He describes some of the tensions surrounding working in a military research environment in the midst of the Vietnam War. Kuckuck describes in broad detail his four decades in research and administration at Livermore, including some of the key collaborations both within government and in the private technical sector. He describes his work at the Nevada Test Site and the challenges inherent in underground nuclear testing. Kuckuck reflects on the competitive relationship between Livermore and Los Alamos and the nature of his advisory work on verification issues and SDI research in Washington during the late stage of the Cold War. Kuckuck describes the impact of the end of the Cold War on nuclear testing and the creation of the NNSA. At the end of the interview, Kuckuck explains the complex factors leading to his brief directorship of Los Alamos, and he reflects on his efforts to maintain the viability and reputation for cutting edge research at the lab over the long term. 

In this interview, David Zierler, Oral Historian for AIP, interviews Douglas Brash, Professor in the Department of Therapeutic Radiology in the Yale School of Medicine. Brash recounts his childhood in a rural community outside of Cleveland, and then in Chicago, and he describes his early interests in science and his determination to become a physicist by the third grade. He discusses his education at Illinois where he majored in engineering physics, and he describes his formative summer job at Livermore Laboratory which helped to compel him to pursue biophysics for graduate school. Brash discusses his research at Ohio State under the supervision of Karl Kornacker, and the work of his graduate adviser, Ron Hart who was focused on DNA repair. Brash discusses his interests in aging and molecular biology which was the foundation for his dissertation, and he provides an overview of biophysics as a discrete field in the 1970s. He discusses the distinctions in his research regarding basic science and clinically relevant therapies as it relates to understanding cancer, and he describes the varying interests in environmental carcinogenesis and retroviruses as a basis for cancer research. Brash explains the origins of the discovery of oncogenes and the connection leading to his specialty in skin cancer research. He describes his postdoctoral research at Harvard and the Dana Farber Institute with Bill Haseltine working on DNA damage and mutagenesis. Brash discusses his subsequent work at the NIH where he continued his research in cell mutation and where he began to study the effect of UV rays on skin cancer. He explains the circumstances leading to his decision to join the faculty at Yale, where he realized he had greater opportunity to continue examining UV rays and skin cancer. Brash offers an overview of the major advances over the last two decades in skin cancer research, and he describes the central importance in DNA sequencing and Chemiecxitation. He discusses the many research advantages associated with having an appointment in a medical school, and at the of the interview, Brash describes the value of bringing a physics approach to cancer research, and some of the policy and communication implications that come with working at the cutting edge of the field. 

This interview was conducted by Morgan Seag for her graduate research work on the U.S. Antarctic Program at the Scott Polar Research Institute, University of Cambridge.  In this interview, Mosley-Thompson discusses her family background and upbringing in West Virginia, her interest in science from an early age, her decision to study physics in college, and the happenstance manner in which she became involved with the Institute of Polar Studies at the Ohio State University.  Mosley-Thompson describes extracting the climate history of an Antarctic ice core for her Ph.D. and the circumstances leading to her first visit to Antarctica in 1982, and what it was like to be among the first female scientists working in this field.  The interview covers Mosely-Thompson’s subsequent trips to the Antarctic and other locales for field research, and her thoughts on the changing programmatic and research aspects of the field over the past three decades. Mosley-Thompson also discusses her involvement in federally-supported research initiatives and her specialized contributions in data analysis and graphing, while balancing family and research responsibilities with her husband and fellow scientist and Ohio State University professor Lonnie Thompson.  The interview concludes with Mosely-Thompson’s description of her work as Director of the Byrd Center and her ongoing interest in research and teaching.  

In this interview Ray Kidder discusses topics such as: Atomic Energy Commission; Lawrence Livermore Laboratory; California Institute of Technology (Caltech); Manhattan Project; serving in the navy as a technician during World War II; finishing his undergraduate degree at Ohio State University; hydrogen bombs; nuclear weapons; laser fusion; underground nuclear testing facilities; Richard Rhodes; Theodore Maiman; Keith Brueckner; Edward Teller; Los Alamos National Laboratory; Arms Control and Disarmament Agency (ACDA); Hans Bethe; KMS Fusion.

This interview with Jim Stith was conducted following his retirement as Vice President of the AIP’s Physics Resource Center. It covers his childhood in rural Virginia, and how he became interested in science, attendance at segregated schools, and at Virginia State University, where he received a BS degree in physics 1963 and an MS in physics in 1964. It discusses his work in physics under John Hunter, the third African-American to receive a PhD in the subject. The interview then covers his drafting into the Army during the Vietnam War, and his work in air defense in Korea, as well as his brief and successful career as an associate engineer at RCA under Bob Pontz. His graduate education and obtaining of a D.Ed degree in physics in 1972 at Pennsylvania State University is discussed. The interview then focuses on his lengthy career as an instructor of physics at the United States Military Academy at West Point (1972-1993), his experiences as an African-American physicist, and his work in the field of physics education. The remainder of the interview concentrates on his move to teach and research physics education at The Ohio State University, his involvement with the American Association of Physics Teachers, and his work at AIP.

Interview discusses, not in chronological order: early home life and schooling; undergraduate at Leiden, influence of Paul Ehrenfest, Jan H. Oort, Jacobus C. Kapteyn, Gerard Kuiper, Antonie Pannekoek, Ejnar Hertzsprung. Recollections of work of Georg Uhlenbeck and Samuel Goudsmit. Assistant to Peter van Rhijn at Groningen ca. 1928, work on various stellar and galactic topics. Move to Harvard, 1929, and atmosphere there under Harlow Shapley. Marriage to Priscilla Fairfield Bok; her contacts with William W. Campbell. Search for and interpretation of spiral auras of our galaxy; studies of stellar density distribution. Activities during World War II. Harvard astronomy group's difficult postwar transition; McCarthyism. Work on nebulae and globules. Comments on astronomy at Mt. Wilson, Tonantziutla, and South Africa. Origins of Harvard radio astronomy and National Radio Astronomy Observatory, and their funding. Move to Australia, 1956, and conditions there. Move to Steward Observatory of University of Arizona, 1964, and conditions there. Location of national observatory at Kitt Peak; management of Kitt Peak. Discussions of astronomy, education, popularization, employment, and organization. Also prominently mentioned are: Wilhelm Heinrich Walter Baade, McGeorge Bundy, Edwin F. Carpenter, Tom Cherry, James Bryant Conant, Arthur Stanley Eddington, Sergei Gaposchkin, Jesse Leonard Greenstein, Haro, David Heeschen, Ejnar Hertzsprung, James Jeans, Ivan Robert King, Bertil Lindblad, Antonia Maury, Nicholas Ulrich Mayall, Joseph McCarthy, Sidney McCuskey, Aden Meinel, Donald Howard Menzel, Robert Menzies, James E. Miller, Edward Arthur Milne, William Wilson Morgan, Edward Charles Pickering, Harry Hemley Plaskett, Nathan Pusey, Martin Schwarzschild, Willem de Sitter, Otto Struve; American Astronomical Society, Associated Universities for Research in Astronomy, Associated Universities, Inc., Boyden Observatory, Case Institute of Technology, Harvard College Observatory, Harvard Series on Astronomy, Indiana University, Mount Stromlo Observatory, National Science Foundation (U.S.), Ohio State University, Princeton University, Rijksuniversiteit te Groningen, Rijksuniversiteit te Leiden, University of Arizona, University of Illinois, University of Michigan, and University of Texas.