Download
1 / 16
160 likes | 257 Views
Scientific Forks in the Road. George Fisher, SSL. In 1980, after two years, I nearly quit graduate school…. I was working in a condensed matter physics laboratory at UCSD, and didn’t really like the research, nor did I much like working with my research advisor…..
E N D
Scientific Forks in the Road George Fisher, SSL
In 1980, after two years, I nearly quit graduate school… I was working in a condensed matter physics laboratory at UCSD, and didn’t really like the research, nor did I much like working with my research advisor….. So I decided to quit that advisor and started over again, looking for a new thesis…
I searched for a new research advisor and eventually encountered Dick Canfield and Sandy McClymont, a postdoc at UCSD. Sandy had recently moved from SSL, where he had been a NATO postdoc supervised by Bob Lin. Canfield became my new advisor Sandy McClymont George Fisher
Solar group colleagues at UC San Diego Elcan Gunkler Fisher McClymont An Hudson Jackson Canfield Woodard Solar Lunch: Photo taken in 1982 or 1983 at “Walker’s Pub” on campus
Bob Lin’s initial impact on my career was through his research (I hadn’t yet met him)…
This paper is one of the most cited articles in Solar Physics, even today
Concept of explosive chromospheric evaporation (from Lin & Hudson 1976)
After 4 years of detailed radiation-hydrodynamic modeling, I found they were mostly right… From Fisher, Canfield & McClymont (1985). At least I got a PhD out of it.
After graduating, I was a postdoc at Lawrence Livermore, and lived in Berkeley from 1984-1986 But the only time I ran into Bob Lin was at scientific meetings! We’d chat, and he’d tell me to come by SSL and visit. Every time I rode my bike by SSL I’d remind myself that I needed to do that but it always seemed like I was too busy… In late 1986, I had the opportunity to re-join many of my old colleagues from UCSD, most of whom had moved to the University of Hawaii.
In 1990 I helped organize a meeting on solar flares and magnetosphericsubstorms at the East-West Center at the University of Hawaii Bob Lin was one of our invited speakers…
In the meantime, the political climate for the solar group at UH deteriorated In the Summer of 1990, I came out to the Bay area to explore possible job openings with colleagues at SSL, Stanford, and Lockheed. Bob Lin was cautiously optimistic about a Senior Fellow opening at SSL. I kept in contact with Bob over the rest of 1990 and 1991.
Finally, there was an ad for a job at SSL… I applied, with encouragement from Bob Lin, and was hired and came to SSL in October 1992. I’ve now been at SSL for nearly twenty years.
SSL is the best place I’ve ever worked, by far: • The intellectual environment is world-class • Entrepreneurial initiative is encouraged • There’s minimal interference by the Director (or other University management) in the running of individual research groups at SSL • Academic freedom is respected In all of these areas, Bob Lin has helped define and maintain this unique research culture of SSL, as a PI scientist and as SSL Director for ten years
Since coming to SSL, we’ve built a self-funded Solar Physics Theory group Masha Kazachenko Ben Lynch Bill Abbett George Fisher Dave Bercik Brian Welsch
The current and previous members of this group gratefully acknowledge the encouragement and support that Bob Lin has given us the past 20 years! • Current members: • Bill Abbett • Dave Bercik • George Fisher • Ben Lynch • Masha Kazachenko • Brian Welsch • Former members: • D. Tod Woods • Mark Linton (PhD, Physics, 1998) • Dana Longcope • Chris Johns-Krull • Neil Griffiths • Lorraine Lundquist (PhD, Physics, 2006) Thanks Bob!
