Interview with Tony Tyson, Distinguished Research Professor at UC Davis in the Department of Physics and Astronomy. The interview begins with Tyson sharing stories from his childhood in southern California and his early interest in ham radio. He discusses his undergraduate studies at Stanford and his introduction to low-temperature physics. Tyson describes his graduate studies at University of Wisconsin and a fellowship at University of Chicago. He explains his thesis experiment on phase transitions and discusses having both Dave Douglas and Chandrasekhar as advisors. Tyson recalls being recruited by Bell Labs and talks about his initial work there on gravitational radiation. He describes branching out into cosmology and astrophysics and recounts his time in John Wheeler’s gravity group at the Institute for Advanced Study. Tyson reflects on the impact of CCDs and his role in their development for astronomy. Tyson also discusses the evolution of the LSST project, of which he is the founding director. Topics include site selection, funding and fundraising, and the renaming of the project for Vera Rubin. The interview concludes with Tyson sharing his hopes for the future of the field and his excitement for the new discoveries that will inevitably come from the LSST.
This is a three-part interview with Sir Robert S. J. Sparks, the Chaning Wills Professor of Geology in the Department of Earth Sciences at the University of Bristol. The interview begins with anecdotes from Sparks’ childhood and memories of undergraduate geological field trips while at Imperial College. He recalls the influences of John Ramsay and George Walker, the latter of whom became his PhD advisor. Sparks discusses Walker’s emphasis on writing and publishing, and he talks about some of his early publications. Sparks then describes his time in the U.S. at the University of Rhode Island, describing key differences between the scientific communities in the U.S. and Europe. The second session focuses on Sparks’ time at Cambridge, his teaching philosophy, and the culture within the Earth Sciences department at Cambridge. He discusses the different funding opportunities he secured from the NSF, NERC, and BP. Sparks recalls his sabbatical in Australia and recounts the factors leading to his appointment at Bristol. In the third session, Sparks reflects on his most influential papers over the years, as well as changes he has witnessed within Bristol’s earth sciences department. He discusses his involvement in the Royal Society and American Geophysical Union, as well as his time as President of both the Geological Society of London and the International Association of Volcanology and Chemistry of the Earth’s Interior (IAVCEI). The interview concludes with Sparks’ reflections on the many accolades he has received in his career and his thoughts on the role of scientists as public intellectuals.
In this interview, Cornell University physicist Maury Tigner discusses his involvement with the Superconducting Super Collider, as well as other collider construction projects in the U.S. and abroad. He reflects on the character of discussions relating to the project that became the SSC at the 1982 Snowmass workshop and a workshop he chaired at Cornell in early 1983, including his early presumption that costs would prove prohibitive. He discusses the conflict over recommending the termination of Brookhaven National Lab’s Isabelle collider that took place on the 1983 subpanel of the High Energy Physics Advisory Panel chaired by Stanley Wojcicki, and he offers his perspective on the positions on Isabelle of President Reagan’s science advisor, DOE career officials, and European subpanel participants John Adams and Carlo Rubbia. Tigner recalls his recruitment of Wojcicki to the SSC Reference Designs Study and his experiences leading the SSC Central Design Group, including R&D funding limitation and oversight by Universities Research Association and the Department of Energy. He offers his perception that he was never seriously considered for the role of SSC Laboratory Director. Tigner also discusses the cost-conscious tradition of accelerator construction at Cornell University, memories of working with Helen Edwards, and the National Science Foundation’s support for Cornell’s accelerator laboratory. The interview concludes with an overview of Tigner’s more recent activities in China and his work on the Handbook of Accelerator Physics and Engineering.
This interview is part of a series conducted during research for the book Tunnel Visions, a history of the Superconducting Super Collider. In it, former Rep. Howard Wolpe, a Democrat from Michigan, discusses his opposition to the project through to his departure from Congress in 1992. He states that he was skeptical of the project prior to his engagement with it as chair of the Investigations and Oversight Subcommittee of the House Science Committee. Wolpe and the subcommittee’s top Republican, Rep. Sherwood Boehlert, used their investigative powers and platform to build a case against the SSC, and Wolpe indicates that Rep. George Brown, the chair of the full committee and an SSC supporter, did not interfere with them. Wolpe recalls his dismay over the SSC’s management and the failure to garner international contributions. He reflects that defense of the project came mainly from the Texas delegation, which he remembers as being well organized. Wolpe also praises the work of his staff members on the SSC matter as well as other oversight matters, such as management of national labs and the integrity of the National Science Foundation’s workforce statistics. He notes that after his departure from Congress, staff member Bob Roach was a key player in moving oversight to the House Energy and Commerce Committee under Rep. John Dingell. Wolpe further states that opposition within the physics community to the SSC helped him deflect accusations that he was not a strong supporter of basic research.
Interview with Dr. Diane McKnight, professor at the University of Colorado, Boulder, and currently program director for the Arctic Observing Network at the National Science Foundation. The interview begins with McKnight recounting her childhood with both parents having doctorate degrees, and she discusses the early science influences in her life. McKnight describes her decision to attend MIT for her undergraduate studies and subsequently her graduate studies in engineering, where she worked with Francois Morel. She discusses her engineering classes, campus life at MIT, and the challenges of being a woman in a male-dominated field. McKnight then recalls how her early career work at the US Geological Survey led to her work in Antarctica. She shares stories of life at McMurdo Station, meeting Al Gore, and working on the Palmer Station Long Term Ecological Research project (LTER). At the end of the interview, McKnight reflects on how this work influenced her life and what life has been like since.
This interview is part of a series conducted during research for the book Tunnel Visions, a history of the Superconducting Super Collider. It also covers a range of other topics concerning George (Jay) Keyworth’s service between 1981 and 1985 as science advisor to President Ronald Reagan. Keyworth recounts his previous career at Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory, his selection as science advisor, his access to White House policymaking via counselor to the president Ed Meese, and his own interactions with Reagan. He notes that Reagan had a faith in technological ingenuity as part of a broadly optimistic outlook on humanity. Keyworth also discusses his strong relationship with engineer and executive David Packard as well as deliberations concerning stealth technology, missile basing, the AIDS crisis, and space policy. He expresses disdain for the space station and space shuttle programs and his regret that the Reagan administration did not do more to reform NASA. He recalls spending political capital securing White House support for basic research, including the SSC and funding increases for the National Science Foundation. He argues that Brookhaven National Lab’s Isabelle collider was poorly justified whereas the SSC was an ambitious and inspiring project. Keyworth asserts that he was able to commit the White House Office of Management and Budget to pursuing the SSC before he was assigned full-time to working on the Strategic Defense Initiative ballistic missile defense program in 1983.
In this interview, Michael Turner discusses his life and career. topics include: Kavli Foundation; Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics; Fred Kavli; Aspen Center for Physics; Rand Corporation; California Institute of Technology (Caltech); Robbie Vogt; Ed Stone; Barry Barish; SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory; B.J. Bjorken; University of Chicago; Dave Schramm; Kip Thorne; Fermi Institute / University of Chicago Institute for Nuclear Studies; Bob Wagoner; University of California, Santa Barbara; Larry Smarr; Dan Goldin; quarks-to-cosmos study; National Science Foundation; Rita Colwell; Advanced LIGO; Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA); IceCube South Pole Neutrino Observatory; Department of Energy; Argonne National Laboratory; Paul Steinhardt.
Interview with Neal Lane, University Professor Emeritus and Professor Emeritus of Physics and Astronomy at Rice University, with an additional affiliation at the Baker Institute for Public Policy. Lane recounts his childhood in Oklahoma and his education at the University of Oklahoma, where Chun Lin became his thesis advisor for his research on the excitation of a sodium atom from its ground state. He discusses his postdoctoral appointment at Queen’s University of Belfast to work with Alex Dalgarno before taking a position at JILA in Boulder. Lane describes his work with Sydney Geltman and the opportunity to take a faculty position at Rice, and he discusses his role as NSF physics division director. He narrates his decision to become chancellor at the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, before returning to Rice to serve as provost. Lane describes how the Clinton administration invited him to lead the NSF. He explains the importance of direct communication with OMB, his relationship with Al Gore, and the key guidance offered by National Academy reports. Lane describes the LIGO effort from his vantage point at the NSF, and he explains his time as director of OSTP and Assistant to the President for Science and Technology. Lane discusses his work for PCAST and in the creation of the NNSA, and he describes returning to Rice after Gore lost the presidency, where the Baker Institute allowed him an environment to continue working in science and policy. At the end of the interview, Lane emphasizes the power of human connections as the foundation of all good science and policy endeavors.
Interview with John Spence, Richard Snell Professor of Physics at Arizona State University. Spence discusses his dual role as a Director of Science at NSF and his focus on research at the intersection of biology and physics. He recounts his childhood in Australia and his undergraduate education at Queensland University. Spence describes his graduate research on plasmons at Melbourne and the opportunities that led to his postdoctoral appointment at Oxford, where he worked with Mike Whelan and David Cockayne on quantifying atom arrangements in solids. He describes his decision to join the faculty at Arizona State, and the nascent field of high-resolution electron microscopy, which compelled him to write a book on the topic. Spence discusses his work on the structure of defects in superconductors and his collaborations with Bell Labs, and he explains the significance of the LCLS to his research. He describes the BioXFEL project, his work as part of the broader community of crystallographers, and the intellectual origins of the book "Lightspeed". At the end of the interview, Spence credits Michael Crow for bringing ASU to the forefront of so much innovation in science, and he reflects on how physics has never failed to surprise him.
In this interview, Dean Zollman discusses: interests in current physics education research (PER); family background and childhood; PhD at Maryland under Carl Levinson and Manoj Banerjee; involvement in civil rights movement; postdoc at Kansas State; collaborations with Bob Fuller and Tom Campbell; involvement with American Association of Physics Teachers (AAPT); Jack Renner’s research on the intellectual development of college students; overview of the big names and ideas in PER in the early-to-mid 70s; research on how to meet students’ current developmental levels and capabilities; hands-on and visual approaches to physics learning; NSF-funded work at University of Utah, developing instructional laser discs with Bob Fuller and Tom Campbell; forays into using video for physics instruction and early application of computers to physics education; Fulbright at University of Munich; Fascination of Physics collaboration with his partner J.D. Spears; teaching quantum mechanics visually; winning the Milikan Award; the Physics InfoMall CD-ROM project; relationship with NSF; Center for Research and Innovation in STEM Education project and COVID’s damage to its realization; Oersted Medal; crossovers with field of psychology in researching how learning happens; internet-based Pathways project for high school instructors; collaborations with the International Commission on Physics Education; the excitement of helping people learn; and the hope that innovative teaching strategies will draw in a more diverse student body to solve the big physics questions of our time. Toward the end of the interview, Zollman looks forward to continuing PER both on the fundamentals of how students learn as well as on applied methods for teaching. He notes that the quest to understand the mechanisms of learning invite a more interdisciplinary approach going forward.
