Two Caltech professors and five Caltech alumni have been elected to the prestigious National Academy of Sciences (NAS). The announcement was made Tuesday, April 30.
Dianne Newman is the Gordon M. Binder/Amgen Professor of Biology and Geobiology and the Allen V. C. Davis and Lenabelle Davis Leadership Chair of Caltech's Center for Environmental Microbial Interactions. Her research focuses on how microorganisms generate energy under conditions where oxygen is scarce—from sediments to soils to chronic infections. She uses geochemical tools to facilitate environmentally informed mechanistic studies of diverse bacteria. Newman is also Caltech's executive officer for molecular biology. In 2016, she was named a MacArthur Fellow.
Barry Simon is the International Business Machines Professor of Mathematics and Theoretical Physics, Emeritus. Known as one of the founding fathers of modern mathematical physics, Simon has made contributions to the mathematical areas of quantum field theory, statistical mechanics, Schrödinger operators, and the theory of orthogonal polynomials. In 2017, Simon received the 2018 Dannie Heineman Prize for Mathematical Physics from the American Physical Society and the American Institute of Physics.
Newman and Simon join 71 current Caltech faculty and one trustee as members of the NAS. Included among this year's new members are five alumni: Christopher Bretherton (BS '80), Edward Callaway (PhD '88), Mark Reid (PhD '76), Bernard Schutz Jr. (PhD '72), and Sue VandeWoude (BS '82).
The National Academy of Sciences is a private nonprofit organization of scientists and engineers dedicated to the furtherance of science and its use for the general welfare. It was established in 1863 by a congressional act of incorporation signed by Abraham Lincoln that calls on the academy to act as an official adviser to the federal government, upon request, in any matter of science or technology.
Written by Lori Dajose