Dr. Elbio Dagotto Named to NRC Committee

July 10, 2006

Distinguished Professor Elbio Dagotto has been appointed to the National Research Council’s Solid State Sciences Committee (SSSC), a body that helps set the national agenda for materials research.

The SSSC is one of 11 committees comprising the Board on Physics and Astronomy, the National Academies’ principal forum for physics and astronomy issues. (The National Research Council is one of four organizations that make up the National Academies; the others are the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, and the Institute of Medicine.) The SSSC offers advice and makes recommendations on matters related to materials research and development. They meet twice each year and every two-to-three years they sponsor a forum in Washington for the solid-state community, federal agency representatives, and elected officials to encourage a national discussion on materials research.

Dr. Elbio Dagotto (Photo by Jack Parker)

The SSSC includes roughly 20 members with expertise in solid-state physics and chemistry, electronic materials, metallurgy, polymers, and the basic materials science aspects of ceramics. Among their current projects are an assessment and outlook project for condensed matter and materials physics and an assessment of the impact of the National Science Foundation’s Materials Research Science and Engineering Centers Program. Dr. Dagotto will join the committee at the October meeting in Irvine, California, to begin his three-year appointment.

Dr. Dagotto came to UT in 2004 with a joint appointment as a distinguished professor of physics at UT and a distinguished scientist at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. His research area is theoretical condensed matter physics, where he specializes in developing computer models to investigate how electrons in materials behave.