Plasma physics

Interview with George Paulikas, retired Executive Vice President of the Aerospace Corporation. Paulikas describes his birth country of Lithuania and his family’s experiences in World War II and the convoluted path that brought his family to the United States in 1949. He recounts his teenage years in Chicago and his undergraduate education, at the University of Illinois, first at Chicago and then Champaign-Urbana where he majored in engineering physics. Paulikas discusses his graduate research at UC Berkeley where he focused on plasma physics under the direction of Ken Watson, he describes his first job at Aerospace as a member of the Space Physics Laboratory, and he explains the historical origins of the corporation, and its key mission to assist the U.S. Air Force in the planning, development, acquisition, and operations of national security space systems. Paulikas describes his ascent at Aerospace as Lab Director and the emphasis on basic research that ensured his integration with the broader space physics community. He explains the circumstances of being named Vice President of the Laboratories, then Vice President of the Development Group, where he focused on planning functions future Air Force systems. Paulikas describes Aerospace as a Federally Funded Research and Development Center and he discusses some of the major projects at the corporation, including the Manned Orbiting Laboratory, the Space Transportation System, the creation of GPS, and its involvement in Reagan’s SDI program. He discusses his subsequent role as Senior Vice President of Programs and his focus on getting space launches right before he was named Executive Vice President. At the end of the interview, Paulikas reflects on how Aerospace responded to the end of the Cold War and its increasing emphasis on space exploration, and he emphasizes his pride in his record of mentorship.

Interview with Alvin Trivelpiece, American physicist who served as Director of the Office of Energy Research in the United States Department of Energy from 1981-1987. Trivelpiece provides an overview of his graduate studies at Caltech and his background in plasma physics. He discusses in detail his involvement in the beginnings of the SSC (Superconducting Super Collider), including cost estimations, funding requests, site selection, and attempts to secure international collaboration. Trivelpiece shares stories involving many key players who were supporters of the SSC, as well as some who were opposed. He also touches on the creation of other DOE projects such as Fermilab and CEBAF (Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility).

This wide-ranging interview explores the career of Jim Decker, most of which has been at the U.S. Department of Energy and its predecessor agencies. Decker first worked in the fusion energy program, and from 1985 to 2007 he was Principal Deputy Director of the DOE Office of Energy Research, which was renamed the Office of Science in 1998. The position was the highest-level career position within the office. The interview covers the evolving fortunes of fusion research in the U.S., including expanding support in the 1970s, U.S. participation in the international ITER project, and deep funding cuts in the 1990s. The leadership of Al Trivelpiece at the office, the development of DOE’s high-performance computing efforts, and the management of the Superconducting Super Collider project are discussed in some detail. Other subjects include the origins of DOE’s support for the Human Genome Project, the development of DOE’s procedures for oversight of major projects, recent trends toward funding “centers” and special initiatives, the evolving status of the Office of Science within DOE, and Decker’s experiences with Congress and successive presidential administrations.

Interview with Berndt Müller, James B. Duke Professor of Physics at Duke University. The interview begins with Müller discussing his current work on quark-gluon plasma physics and the connections between nuclear physics and cosmology. Müller then recounts his family history in Germany during and after WWII, as well as his childhood in West Germany. He recalls his undergraduate studies at Goethe University Frankfurt, where it was the inspiring lectures that catalyzed his enthusiasm for physics. Müller explains the heavy ion research he was involved in at the time, as well as his master’s thesis on the Dirac equation. He recounts his first visit to Berkeley Lab in 1972 and his subsequent acceptance of a postdoc at University of Washington and a fellowship at Yale. Müller then returned to Frankfurt as an associate professor and explains how he got involved in quark-gluon plasma research. Müller talks about the creation of the RHIC and how that led him to pursue his next job in the US, landing at Duke. He discusses his involvement with the Institute of Nuclear Theory at the University of Washington, as well as his work at Brookhaven over the years. Müller recalls the pros and cons of the administrative side of academia, which he experienced as the Chair of the Faculty of Physics and then Dean of the Faculty of Natural Sciences at Duke. The interview concludes with Müller’s reflections on winning the Feshbach Prize and his predictions for the future of theoretical nuclear physics.

Interview with A.J. Stewart Smith, the Class of 1909 Professor of Physics, emeritus, at Princeton University, who also served as the university vice president for the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory. Smith begins the interview with an overview of his affiliations with SNOLAB, CERN, and Italian Nuclear and Particle Physics. He recaps the effects of the pandemic on experimental particle physics. Smith then summarizes his family history and his childhood in Canada, where he became interested in the sciences in high school. Smith recalls his undergraduate studies in physics at University of British Columbia, where he also earned a master’s degree, as well as his decision to pursue a PhD at Princeton. He describes working on the Princeton-Penn Accelerator with his advisor Pierre Piroue, and the subsequent offer of a fellowship at DESY working with Sam Ting on QED. Smith recounts his move back to Princeton to join the faculty, and he describes the “bipartisanship” between experimentalists and theorists at the time. He discusses the origins of the Chicago-Princeton collaboration at Fermilab, his involvement with E-787 experiment at Brookhaven, and his time as technical coordinator and spokesperson for the BaBar experiment. The interview concludes with Smith’s recollections of his time as Princeton’s first dean of research, as well as his reflections on times when theory has led experimentation, and vice versa.

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In this interview, Brandon Sorbom, Chief Science Officer at Commonwealth Fusion Systems, discusses the development of his company and interest in nuclear fusion. Sorbom speaks about his time as an undergraduate student at Loyola Marymount University where he majored in Electrical Engineering and Physics and how he discovered his interest in fusion during this time. He describes how his interest in nuclear fusion led him to pursue graduate school at MIT. He details his time as a graduate student working at the MIT Plasma Science and Fusion Center, as well as his experience working with his advisor Dennis Whyte. Sorbom discusses how he first became involved in the development of SPARC, whose goal is to generate net energy from fusion, during his time at MIT. He details the variety of investors for his company and the roles he and his cofounders take on within CSF. Sorbom explains CSF’s current project of demonstrating that superconducting magnets at high fields can be used in fusion. Lastly, Sorbom discusses how fusion energy will likely become the dominant form of energy in the future and how it can help combat climate change.

Interview with Roald Sagdeev, professor of physics emeritus at the University of Maryland. He recounts his family’s ethnic Tatar heritage, his childhood in Kazan, and his family’s experience during World War II. Sagdeev describes his physics education at Moscow State University, and how he felt regarding the larger issues of physics and Soviet national security – especially during his time in Sarov, which was the equivalent of Los Alamos National Lab for nuclear weapons research. He discusses his work on radiation transport in stellar atmospheres, his subsequent research at the Kurchatov Institute, and his graduate research in controlled nucleosynthesis under the direction of Lev Landau. Sagdeev describes this time as the origins of his expertise in plasma physics and he explains the work he was doing at a classified site in Siberia. He explains how major Cold War events including the Cuban Missile Crisis and nuclear diplomacy affected his career and his moral satisfaction in not contributing to weapons science. Sagdeev discusses his work at the Institute of Physics of High Temperatures, and his developing interests in astrophysics, and he explains his subsequent tenure at the Space Research Institute of the Academy of Sciences, and why the American moon landing demonstrated that Russia had ceded its dominance in the Space Race. He explains why manned space missions were always more politicized than unmanned missions and describes the political value of the Soviet-US Soyuz-Apollo test project as an opportunity for “hand shaking in space.” Sagdeev discusses his experiences advising Gorbachev on disarmament negotiations, and he shares his perspective on SDI and why it was actually the Pershing missile system that contributed more to the Soviet collapse than U.S. defense spending under Reagan. He describes witnessing the end of the Cold War as watching a movie in slow motion, and he explains how he met Susan Eisenhower and the circumstances leading to his move to the United States, where he joined the faculty at the University of Maryland and served as an adviser to NASA. Sagdeev explains his current interests in intergalactic shock waves and he shares his ideas on the newly formed U.S. Space Force and the weaponizing of space. At the end of the interview, Sagdeev shares that if he could start his career all over again, he would focus on neuroscience.

Interview with Margaret Murnane, professor of physics at the University of Colorado, Boulder, fellow at JILA, and director of the NSF STROBE Science and Technology Center. Murnane recounts her childhood in Ireland and emphasizes that, culturally, she was encouraged to pursue her interests in science from a young age. She discusses her undergraduate education at University College Cork where she focused on physics and developed her specialties in experimentation with light. Murnane describes the opportunities leading to her graduate work at UC Berkeley, where, for her thesis research, she developed a high-power femtosecond laser to create X-ray emitting plasma. She describes her first faculty appointment at Washington State University in Pullman where she continued work in ultrafast laser science, and she explains the decision to transfer to the University of Michigan at the Center for Ultrafast Optics. Murnane discusses her subsequent decision to join the faculty at JILA, where the instrumentation and opportunities for collaboration in her field were peerless. She describes the centrality of achieving very fast X-ray pulses to her field, and she describes some recent advances in applications such as EUV lithography. Murnane discusses the work that remains to be done to ensure that STEM promotes diversity and inclusivity, and she reflects on the many excellent graduate students she has mentored. At the end of the interview, Murnane conveys her excitement at the possibilities offered in the future of ultrafast lasers, including the ability of real-time microscopes that can make three-dimensional nanoscale and A-scale movies.

Interview with Peter Lyons, former Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Energy in the Department of Energy. Lyons describes his consulting work as an advisor to National Laboratories, for Jordan’s Atomic Energy Advisory Board, and as a Distinguished Energy Fellow at the Institute of Energy Economics of Japan. He recounts his childhood in Nevada, and he discusses his undergraduate education in physics at the University of Arizona. Lyons discusses the opportunities that led to his graduate research at Caltech where Charlie Barnes and Willy Fowler were formative influences for his work on stellar nucleosynthesis. He describes his postdoctoral appointment at Los Alamos to work on laser fusion and his work in the plasma group. Lyons explains the value of fiber optics for nuclear testing, and he describes his view of SDI when he was a program director at the Lab. He describes his work as Deputy Associate Director for Defense Research and Applications, and how the end of the Cold War was felt at the Lab and in particular for its work in securing the nuclear stockpile of the former Soviet Union. Lyons describes how the Lab adapted to post-Cold War research during his time as Deputy Associate Director for Energy and Environment, and how he became increasingly interested in civilian energy issues. He discusses how the Lab became more involved as a partner to major industrial projects, and he explains his decision to leave the Lab to work for Senator Pete Domenici as science advisor, where he was closely involved in legislation on a number of scientific projects. Lyons describes recent advances in civilian nuclear energy and why hydrogen will be a significant player in the energy future. He discusses his tenure at NRC Commissioner, and his appointment at the Department of Energy with the incoming Obama administration. Lyons explains the impact of the Fukushima disaster on broader discussions relating to civilian nuclear energy, and he explains his decision to retire and the satisfaction he has felt as many of the program he contributed to continue to grow. At the end of the interview, Lyons provides a broad view on where civilian nuclear energy is on the right track as part of a carbon neutral future, and where he sees opportunities for technical and administrative improvement.