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Spring 2000
Change is an essential part of life, and that is especially clear at this time in the Knoxville-Oak Ridge area. On October 20, the Department of Energy announced the choice of UT-Battelle to manage the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. This is a huge victory for our University, and will bring much benefit to ORNL. This change in management affects me personally, as I became the Deputy Directory for Science and Technology at the laboratory on April 1. This provides me the exciting opportunity to build upon many examples of UT-ORNL partnerships to bring a new set of shared programs with UT and a wider set of universities. Duke, Florida State, Georgia Tech, North Carolina State, Virginia Tech, and Virginia are the six institutions named in our proposal as the "core universities" and they will work closely with ORNL, UT-Battelle, and UT in the future.
The change at ORNL management brings change to the physics department, as I began a leave of absence on April 1. The past four years have been very exciting, as I have greatly enjoyed being the head of the department. The support of the faculty, staff, and students has been wonderful. With their help, it has been very fulfilling for me to begin a more systematic communication with our alumni and supporters through this newsletter and the Board of Visitors. This is an extremely fine department, and it is difficult for me to end my headship and the day-to-day involvement in departmental affairs.
These changes bring a very fine person to the department as the next head: Dr. Joachim Burgdoerfer. An internal search for my successor was conducted, and Dean Lorayne Lester recently announced the appointment of Professor Burgdoerfer as head of physics and astronomy. Joachim is a highly acclaimed atomic theorist. He has been on our faculty since 1982 and runs a very fine research program. For the past two and a half years, he has been on partial leave as a chaired professor at the Vienna University of Technology in Austria. Nevertheless, he has maintained his base of research and supervision of graduate students here at UT. Joachim will return to our department on a full-time basis and assume the reins of the physics department in the summer. In the interim, Dean Lester has asked Professor Tom Callcott to serve as the acting head. This results from another change, as Tom has ended his nine-year tenure as director of the Science Alliance to return to our department on a full-time basis.
Change is also affecting other members of our faculty. Professor Hanno Weitering has accepted a prestigious offer of a chaired professorship at Delft University in The Netherlands. That is a big loss to our department, since Hanno has built an excellent program in experimental condensed-matter physics. A recent addition is Dr. David Mandrus, who joined us on January 1 as a collaborating scientist between the physics department and the ORNL Solid State Division. His expertise is the synthesis of new materials that are important in condensed-matter physics and eventually technical applications.
In spite of these changes, many aspects of physics department life will remain the same. With the support of the faculty, staff, and students, Joachim Burgdoerfer will lead an already strong department to even greater heights of accomplishment. The recruitment of new physics students (both undergraduate and graduate) will remain a challenge, in view of a booming economy and the availability of jobs. Partnerships between our department and ORNL will continue to bring strength to both institutions. Bill Bugg will continuing teaching and doing research in elementary-particle physics, probably until the day he drops. And I will stay involved in the department through my research in nuclear physics with Carrol Bingham and the students, post docs, and visitors working with me. I encourage our friends and alumni to stay engaged with the department, telling us of your successes and sending us leads on new students and programs. The future is very exciting.
Back to Cross Sections, Fall 1999 issue. |