Exxon Corporation

Interview with Thomas Witten, Homer J. Livingston Professor, Emeritus, in the Department of Physics, James Franck Institute. Witten recounts his childhood in Maryland, Utah, and then Colorado, as his father, a medical doctor moved jobs, and he describes his undergraduate experience at Reed College and where majored in physics and where he benefited from excellent attention from the professors. He discusses his graduate work at UC San Diego, where he was advised by Shang Ma working on two-dimensional charged Bose gas research, and he describes his postdoctoral research at Princeton to work with John Hopfield. Witten conveys the exotic nature of Ken Wilson’s ideas on renormalization during that time, and he explains the origins of soft matter physics as a distinct field and his work at Saclay before joining the faculty at the University of Michigan. He describes his subsequent research on pushing concepts of renormalization into polymers and related work on the Kondo effect. Witten explains his decision to join the research lab at Exxon, and he conveys Exxon’s emulation of Bell Labs as a place where he could pursue basic science within an industrial research lab, and where he could continue his work on polymers. He describes the downsizing of the lab and his decision to join the faculty at the University of Chicago, and his discusses his developing interests in buckyballs and capillary flow. Witten describes his affiliation with the James Franck Institute and its rich history, and he explains his current interests in granular materials, thin sheets, and colloidal rotation. At the end of the interview, Witten emphasizes the technological impact of fast video on soft matter physics and his interest in the physics of crumpling objects.

In this interview, AIP Oral Historian Jon Phillips interviews Dr. Sean Brennan, emeritus physicist at the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Laboratory. Brennan describes his early life in an academic family, undergraduate education at Catholic University, and graduate education under Arthur Bienenstock at Stanford University, where he began work with synchrotron radiation. He discusses his early work at SLAC with Jo Stohr on X-Ray absorption experiments, and his post-doc at Exxon. Brennan goes on to discuss the development of the facilities and research at SLAC over the course of his tenure there, as well as his work on the NASA Stardust project analyzing asteroid and comet samples. The interview concludes with a discussion of Brennan’s activities after retirement, including programming apps and serving as a ski patrol rescue worker.

Interview with Joachim Stöhr, Professor Emeritus of the Photon Science Department at Stanford and former Associate Laboratory Director at SLAC. Stöhr begins the interview recounting his childhood in Germany, his interest in sports, and his introduction to physics in high school. He discusses his undergraduate studies at Bonn University and his Fulbright scholarship to Washington State University where he studied optical spectroscopy. Stöhr then describes his doctoral studies with Rudolf Mossbauer in Munich, and his subsequent postdoctoral position at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. He recounts his time as a staff scientist at the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource (SSRL) before transitioning into a position at Exxon and then IBM. Stöhr describes his return to Stanford and SSRL, working as Deputy Director and then Director. He then talks about accepting the opportunity to become the first director of the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) and the challenges that came with building up a new program. The interview concludes with Stöhr’s reflections on his return to the science after his directorship and his work on a forthcoming book.

In this interview, David Zierler, Oral Historian for AIP, interviews Thomas Mason, professor of chemistry and biochemistry at UCLA. Mason recounts his childhood in Frederick, MD, and he describes the influence of his father, who was a zoologist. Mason discusses his undergraduate education at the University of Maryland where he pursued a dual degree in physics and electrical engineering, and he describes the opportunity that led to his graduate work at Princeton. He explains his work at Exxon Research and Engineering Lab, where he worked with Dave Weitz, and he describes the growth of soft matter condensed physics. Mason discusses his dissertation in micro-rheology and some of the broader questions in Brownian systems when colloids are micro-dispersed. He describes his postdoctoral work in France with Jerome Bibette, where he focused on the science of emulsification, and he discusses his senior postdoctoral position at Johns Hopkins, where he worked with Scot Kuo who was concentrating on the rheology of concentrated DNA. Mason explains his decision to join Exxon as a principal investigator, where he researched asphaltenes, and he discusses some of the broader advances in soft matter physics fostered at the Exxon lab. He describes his motivations for returning to academia, and in particular his desire to teach, he explains the opportunity leading to his tenure at UCLA, and he describes his contributions to the NanoSystems Institute. Mason discusses his involvement in many of the clinical and therapeutic aspects of soft matter physics, and at the end of the interview, he offers insight on where his broad interests in platform technologies might be relevant as his field continues to grow.

In this interview, Sabyasachi Bhattacharya, Director of The Chatterjee Group - Centers of Research in Education, Science, and Technology, discusses his time working in the United States and India. He discusses his time at Northwestern University as an advisee of John Ketterson and his work with liquid crystals. He also speaks about the interplay between experiment and theory. Bhattacharya details his time as a James Franck Fellow at the University of Chicago and his collaboration with Sid Nagel on the glass transition of glycerol. He speaks about his experience working on charge density waves at Exxon, as well as his discovery of the pseudo-gap phase while there. He discusses working at NEC with vortex phases in type-II superconductors. Bhattacharya reflects on the joy he found teaching physics to undergraduate students. He details his time working at Ashoka University where he was allowed the opportunity to create an undergraduate education framework and build a physics department. Lastly, Bhattacharya discusses the importance of incorporating science into culture.

Interview with Sunil Sinha, Distinguished Professor Emeritus in the Department of Physics at the University of California, San Diego. Sinha describes how he has been able to keep up his research during the COVID pandemic, and he recounts his childhood in Calcutta where he attended Catholic schools and developed his interests in math and science. He describes his undergraduate education at Cambridge where he became interested is quantum mechanics, and he explains his decision to remain there for graduate work to conduct research on neutron scattering under the direction of Gordon Squires. Sinha explains the centrality of neutron scattering to the development of condensed matter physics, and he describes the opportunities leading to his postdoctoral research at Iowa State. He discusses his work at Ames Lab and Argonne Lab, where he continued to pursue fundamental research on neutron scattering and rare earth materials. Sinha describes his research at Exxon Lab, and the start of the revolution in soft matter physics, and he explains his decision to return to Argonne at the beginning of the Advanced Photon Source project. He discusses his subsequent move to San Diego where he enjoyed a joint appointment with Los Alamos Lab and when he was able to concentrate more fully on teaching after a career spent mostly in laboratory environments. At the end of the interview, Sinha describes his current interest in spin glasses, exchange biases, and jamming theoretical computer simulations, and he explains the reason for the enduring mystery of the mechanism for high-temperature superconductivity. 

Interview with Eli Yablonovitch, Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences at UC Berkeley. He talks about the overlap of these fields with applied physics, and he recounts his family’s Jewish heritage in Europe and his origin as a Displaced Person born to refugee parents after World War II. Yablonovitch describes his childhood in Montreal, his early interests in science, and his undergraduate experience at McGill where he first became interested in transistors. He explains his decision to attend Harvard in Applied Physics for graduate school to and the intellectual influence of Mike Tinkham. Yablonovitch discusses his thesis research on semiconductor optics and four-wave mixing, and he describes the opportunities that led to his postdoctoral work at Bell Labs to work on laser-based communications systems. He discusses his return to Harvard as a faculty member and his subsequent solar research work at Exxon. Yablonovitch discusses his formative collaboration with Sajeev John and his move to UCLA, and he explains how the rise of the internet fostered his entrepreneurial instincts. He describes his work to improve cellphone antennae and his decision to transfer to Berkeley and the origins of Alta Devices. Yablonovitch describe his current interests in circuits and chips and he shares his view on China’s work in basic science. At the end of the interview, Yablonovitch reflects on outliving many tech companies, some of the intractable challenges of solar energy, and why Feynman’s lectures remain a guiding light for his own interests.

In this interview, Paul Chaikin, Silver Professor of Physics at NYU, recounts his childhood in Brooklyn and he describes his early interests in math and science and his education Stuyvesant High School. He discusses his undergraduate education at Caltech, he conveys how special it was to learn from Feynman and Pauling, and he explains the fields that would go on to form his area of specialty, soft matter physics. Chaikin explains his reasoning to pursue a graduate degree with Bob Schrieffer at Penn, where he did his thesis research on the Kondo effect in superconductors. He describes his first postgraduate work at UCLA where he developed an expertise in thermoelectric power, and he describes the intellectual and technological developments that paved the way for the creation of soft matter physics as a distinct field. Chaikin explains what it would take to solve the many-body problem of nonequilibrium phenomena, and he describes the delicate nature of collaborating with biologists while ensuring they don’t overtake the field. He discusses his joint appointment with Penn physics and the research laboratory at Exxon, and he explains his move to Princeton, which was just starting to develop a program in soft matter physics. Chaikin describes the famous experiment that discovered that M&M shapes (ellispoids) provided the most efficient and minimal negative space in packing applications, and he explains his decision to join the faculty at NYU. At the end of the interview, Chaikin reflects on some of the remaining mysteries in the field, and he describes his interest in pursing research on self-assembly among soft condensed matters.  

Philip Pincus is a Distinguished Professor of Materials, Physics, and Biomolecular Science at UC Santa Barbara. In this interview, he explains the origin of his nickname “Fyl,” he recounts his childhood in San Francisco, as well as his decision to study physics at Berkeley and his mentorship by Charlie Kittel. Pincus describes his thesis research on temperature dependence of anisotropy energy, and nuclear spin relaxation in magnetic materials. He describes his postdoctoral work at Saclay and his faculty appointment at UCLA, and he describes working with de Gennes and Alan Heeger. Pincus describes his contributions to dirty type II superconductors and the excitement surrounding early research on liquid crystals. He explains his decision to join the research lab at Exxon Mobil and he describes the basic science research culture there and his increasing focus on soft matter physics, which he continued to pursue at UC Santa Barbara in the Chemical Engineering Department. Pincus discusses his current interests in water and cohesive energy, and at the end of the interview, he reflects on the growth of soft matter physics out of his original interest in solid state physics, and he explains why condensed matter theorists might have something to offer dark matter research.

This is an interview with David Weitz, professor of physics and applied physics at Harvard. Weitz recounts his childhood in Ottowa, his decision to pursue an undergraduate education in Waterloo, and a formative summer experience at the Weizmann Institute which convinced him to become a scientist. He describes his graduate work at Harvard, where he worked in Mike Tinkham’s group and where he developed his thesis research on the Josephson effect. He discusses his postgraduate work at the laboratory at Exxon where he developed research on de Gennes soft matter physics. Weitz explains his decision to join the faculty at Penn at a time when the basic science culture at Exxon was coming to a close, and Harvard’s successful effort to recruit him shortly thereafter. He discusses his work as director of the Harvard Materials Research, Science and Engineering Center, how he became interested in biophysics and biomedical engineering and how he pursued entrepreneurial and culinary interests from a soft matter perspective. At the end of the interview, Weitz describes his current motivations in using soft matter physics to advance human health and improve fracking as a key part of the American energy system.