Class
| • | 1. Mathematical and Physical Sciences | [X] |
| | 1 | Name: | Dr. Sidney Drell | | | Institution: | Stanford University | | | Year Elected: | 1987 | | | Class: | 1. Mathematical and Physical Sciences | | | Subdivision: | 106. Physics | | | Residency: | Resident | | | Living? : |
Deceased
| | | Birth Date: | 1926 | | | Death Date: | December 21, 2016 | | | | | | |
Sidney D. Drell was professor of theoretical physics (emeritus) at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC), Stanford University, as well as a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at the time of his death on December 21, 2016, at the age of 90. He served as SLAC's deputy director until retiring in 1998. A theoretical physicist and arms control specialist, Dr. Drell had also been active as an adviser to the executive and legislative branches of government on national security and defense technical issues. He was a founding member of JASON, a group of academic scientists who consult for the government on issues of national importance, and he acted as a consultant to the Los Alamos National Laboratory. He was a member of the Advisory Committee to the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA/DOE) and chaired the Senior Review Board for the Intelligence Technology Innovation Center. Dr. Drell was widely recognized for his contributions in the study of theoretical physics, particularly elementary particle processes and quantum theory. His work contributed to the early understanding of meson physics and quantum electrodynamics and then went beyond those areas, ranging from basic studies on quantum chromodynamics on a lattice to such "down the laboratory" problems as the interaction of monopoles with helium. He isolated the processes of secondary particle production from photons from hadron-hadron collisions. Among numerous awards, Dr. Drell received the Heinz award in 2005 for his contributions in public policy, and in 2000 he was awarded the Enrico Fermi Award, the nation's oldest award in science and technology, for a lifetime of achievement in the field of nuclear energy. He also received the 2012 National Medal of Science. He was a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts & Sciences and was coauthor, with J.D. Bjorken, of two books on relativistic quantum mechanics and fields that have been widely translated and used for more than 30 years. | |
| 2 | Name: | Dr. James Gunn | | | Institution: | Princeton University | | | Year Elected: | 1987 | | | Class: | 1. Mathematical and Physical Sciences | | | Subdivision: | 101. Astronomy | | | Residency: | Resident | | | Living? : |
Living
| | | Birth Date: | 1938 | | | | | | |
James Edward Gunn is the Eugene Higgins Professor of Astronomy at Princeton University Observatory. His range of abilities, including great skill in physical theory and applied mathematics, an outstanding capability in the design of novel and powerful instruments, and extensive experience as an observational astronomer with a keen choice of central problems, is unique in astronomy. Dr. Gunn's early theoretical work helped establish the current understanding of how galaxies form and properties of the space between galaxies. He also suggested important observational tests to confirm the presence of dark matter in galaxies. Much of Dr. Gunn's later work has involved leadership in major observational projects. He developed plans for one of the first uses of digital camera technology for space observation, a project that led to the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, the most extensive three-dimensional mapping of the universe ever undertaken. Dr. Gunn has worked as a scientist at JPL and taught at the University of California, Berkeley, the California Institute of Technology, the University of Washington, the University of Chicago, and Rice University. He was a deputy principal investigator on the Wide Field/Planetary Camera on the Hubble Space Telescope, served as the associate director of the Apache Point Observatory and is a MacArthur Fellow. He was also a project scientist and technical director for the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. His numerous honors include the Royal Astronomical Society's Gold Medal, the National Medal of Science (2009) and membership in the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. Dr. Gunn earned his Ph.D. from the California Institute of Technology in 1966 and has served on the faculty at Princeton since 1968. | |
| 3 | Name: | Dr. Jerrold Meinwald | | | Institution: | Cornell University | | | Year Elected: | 1987 | | | Class: | 1. Mathematical and Physical Sciences | | | Subdivision: | 102. Chemistry and Chemical Biochemistry | | | Residency: | Resident | | | Living? : |
Deceased
| | | Birth Date: | 1927 | | | Death Date: | April 24, 2018 | | | | | | |
Jerrold Meinwald, Goldwin Smith Professor of Chemistry Emeritus at Cornell University, died April 24, 2018, at the age of 91. He was educated at the University of Chicago (Ph.B. 1947, B.S. 1948) and at Harvard (M.A. 1950, Ph.D. 1952), where he worked with R.B. Woodward. He was a member of the group of scientists who founded the International Centre of Insect Physiology and Ecology (ICIPE) in Nairobi, and served as an ICIPE Research Director from 1970-77. He is a founding member of CIRCE (the Cornell Institute for Research in Chemical Ecology).
Dr. Meinwald's research covered a very broad range of topics, including molecular rearrangement mechanisms, the synthesis and reactions of highly strained ring systems, organic photochemistry, natural product structure and synthesis, anesthetic stereochemistry, and insect chemical ecology. We typically think of communication as a fairly straightforward phenomenon involving speech, gestures, and more recently, electronic devices. But the majority of creatures interact through different means: a dazzling array of chemical signals. This is how insects talk to each other, find food, mate, bind together in communities, even make war. But it's not only bugs that communicate through chemicals—all living organisms, from microorganisms to human beings, do the same. The study of how organisms communicate and interact with their environment is a specialized field called chemical ecology, bridging organic chemistry and biology. Jerrold Meinwald is universally recognized as its founding father, along with Tom Eisner (1929-2011), his longtime biological collaborator. In a career spanning more than half a century, Meinwald defined chemical ecology as a new science, showing how it can help us better understand the behavior of living creatures and leading to important advances in medicine, pharmacology, and agriculture.
Born in New York, Meinwald attended the University of Chicago and obtained his Ph.D. from Harvard, then settled in for a fellowship at Cornell University, where he has spent his entire career. At first, he was known as a creative organic chemist, studying highly strained small molecules, photochemistry, and analytic spectroscopic techniques. He then became intrigued by the chemical defenses of arthropods. Among his early discoveries were lipophilic compounds secreted by some insects that help toxins permeate an attacker's protective cuticle, and the fact that fireflies and some other insects secrete steroids that make them unattractive meals for predators. He investigated the underlying chemical mechanisms that enabled organisms to synthesize these defensive agents, leading to the realization that one species, perhaps a plant, can make a precursor substance later used by another organism, such as an insect—a relationship between two species manifested at a chemical level.
This work led to the forging of a unique collaboration with Eisner, who had been studying many of the same questions from a biological perspective and arrived at Cornell shortly after Meinwald had joined the faculty. They combined forces to elevate the study of chemical signaling into the new discipline of chemical ecology, with Meinwald probing the chemistry and Eisner investigating the biology. They studied and characterized an extensive variety of chemical signaling and defense mechanisms in insects, plants, birds, fish, and mammals. The interactions they explained, from snakes that derive protective steroids for their eggs and hatchlings from toads they consume, to moths that convert a certain alkaloid to attract females which is later passed on as a defensive chemical to their eggs, to fish that secrete substances literally giving them a bad taste to predators, demonstrate the amazing range of remarkable evolutionary adaptations on Earth. The Meinwald/Eisner partnership opened up brand new vistas in chemistry and biology that are only beginning to be fully explored.
But the work has done even more than give science a deeper insight into the beautiful interconnected web of life on our planet. Meinwald's work in isolating, characterizing, and synthesizing the structure of various compounds used in nature points the way for the development of substances for practical applications: drugs, agricultural chemicals, and other yet unimagined uses. He continues to demonstrate that the natural chemicals that living creatures use to communicate, survive, and thrive have potential and promise waiting to be tapped.
He had been a Visiting Professor at the Harvard Medical School, the Rockefeller University, and the University of California, San Diego. He was an elected member of the National Academy of Sciences (1969), the American Academy of Arts & Sciences (1970) and the American Philosophical Society (1987), and held two J.S. Guggenheim Fellowships (1960-61, 1976-77). He served as a Fellow of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (1983) and as a Fogarty Scholar-in-Residence at the NIH (1983-85). He was elected President of the International Society of Chemical Ecology in 1988. In 1989, he was awarded an honorary Ph.D. by the University of Göteborg. Dr. Meinwald served as a Fellow of the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University (1990-91). He was awarded the Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement in 1990 and the Gustavus John Esselen Award for Chemistry in the Public Interest in 1991. He served three terms as a National Sigma Xi Lecturer (1965, 1975, 1992-94). The Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic awarded him the Heyrovsky Medal in 1996. He was a Senior Visiting Scholar at the American Academy of Arts & Sciences (2004) and was selected for the 2005 Roger Adams Award in Organic Chemistry by the American Chemical Society. He was awarded the 2013 Benjamin Franklin Medal in Chemistry by the Franklin Institute and won the 2014 National Medal of Science.
Music was Dr. Meinwald's chief recreational activity. He studied flute with Arthur Lora, James Pappoutsakis and Marcel Moyse and frequently combines chamber music performances on flute, recorder, or flauto traverso with visiting lectureships. | |
| 4 | Name: | Dr. Louis Nirenberg | | | Institution: | New York University | | | Year Elected: | 1987 | | | Class: | 1. Mathematical and Physical Sciences | | | Subdivision: | 104. Mathematics | | | Residency: | Resident | | | Living? : |
Deceased
| | | Birth Date: | 1925 | | | Death Date: | January 26, 2020 | | | | | | |
A leading mathematician with broad cultural interests, Canadian-born Louis Nirenberg has made seminal contributions to the study of linear and non-linear partial differential equations and their applications. He discovered interactions between mathematical analysis, differential geometry and "complex analysis" and made deep applications to the theory of fluid flow and other physical phenomena. Winner of the first Crafoord Prize of the Royal Swedish Academy (1982), Dr. Nirenberg is currently professor of mathematics emeritus at New York University's Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences. He began his career at NYU in 1949 after receiving his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from the university. From 1970-72 he served as director of the Courant Institute. Dr. Nirenberg's numerous honors include the 1995 National Medal of Science, the American Mathematical Society's Bocher Prize (1959), Guggenheim and Sloan Fellowships and membership in the National Academy of Sciences and American Academy of Arts & Sciences. In 2010, he was awarded the Chern Medal from the International Congress of Mathematicians and in 2014 he received the Leroy P. Steele Prize for Seminal Contribution to Research with Robert Kohn and Luis Caffarelli. He was awarded the 2015 Abel Prize. | |
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