American Philosophical Society
Member History

Results:  1 ItemModify Search | New Search
Page: 1Reset Page
Residency
Resident (1)
Subdivision
106. Physics (1)
1Name:  Dr. Michael S. Turner
 Institution:  University of Chicago
 Year Elected:  2017
 Class:  1. Mathematical and Physical Sciences
 Subdivision:  106. Physics
 Residency:  Resident
 Living? :   Living
 Birth Date:  1949
   
 
Michael S. Turner is a theoretical astrophysicist and the Bruce V. & Diana M. Rauner Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus at the University of Chicago and Senior Strategic Advisor to the Kavli Foundation. He was Director of the Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics at Chicago, which he helped to establish, from 2010 to 2019 is a past-President of the American Physical Society, the 50,000 member organization of physicists. Previous positions include Scientist at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (from 1983 to 1997), assistant Director for the Mathematical and Physical Sciences of the National Science Foundation (2003 to 2006), Chief Scientist of Argonne National Laboratory (2006 to 2008), Chair of the Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics (1997 to 2003), and President (1989 to 1994) and Chairman of the Board (2009 to 2012) of the Aspen Center for Physics. Turner was born in Los Angeles, CA, and attended public schools there; he received his B.S. from Caltech (1971), his M.S. (1973) and Ph.D. (1978) from Stanford (all in physics). He holds an honorary D.Sc. (2005) from Michigan State University and was awarded a Distinguished Alumnus Award from Caltech in 2006. Turner helped to pioneer the interdisciplinary field of particle astrophysics and cosmology, and with Edward Kolb initiated the Fermilab astrophysics program which today accounts for about 10% of the lab’s activities today. He led the National Academy study Quarks to the Cosmos that laid out the strategic vision for the field. Turner’s scholarly contributions include predicting cosmic acceleration and coining the term dark energy, showing how quantum fluctuations evolved into the seed perturbations for galaxies during cosmic inflation, and several key ideas that led to the cold dark matter theory of structure formation. His honors include Warner Prize of the American Astronomical Society, the Lilienfeld Prize of the American Physical Society (APS), the Klopsted Award of the American Association of Physics Teachers, the Heineman Prize (with Kolb) of the AAS and American Institute of Physics, the 2011 Darwin Lecture of the Royal Astronomical Society and 2013 Ryerson Lecture at the University of Chicago. Turner’s twenty-plus former Ph.D. students hold faculty positions at leading universities around the country (e.g., Chicago, Caltech and University of Michigan), at national laboratories (Fermilab, JPL, and Argonne) and on Wall Street. Turner’s national service includes membership on more than 10 NRC Boards and Committees including the Committee on Science, Engineering and Public Policy (COSEPUP), the Senior Editorial Board of Science Magazine, Chairmanship of the OECD Global Science Forum’s Astroparticle Physics International Forum, a member of the Board of Directors of the Fermi Research Alliance, member of the NASA Advisory Council, Secretary and Chair of Class I of the National Academy of Sciences, and the founding Chair of ScienceCounts, a 501©3 organization that promotes the awareness and support of science.
 
Election Year
2017 (1)