Former DOE undersecretary to present Rorschach lecture Jan. 27

Former DOE undersecretary to present Rorschach lecture Jan.
27
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Former Undersecretary
of Energy Ernest Moniz will present the lecture “Nuclear
Power: When You Find Yourself in a Hole, Stop Digging!”
at the eighth annual Rorschach Memorial Lecture Jan. 27.

Sponsored by
the Department of Physics and Astronomy, the lecture will
be at 4 p.m. in Sadie R. Smith Auditorium (Physics Amphitheater),
Herzstein Hall. A reception in Martel Hall, Anne and Charles
Duncan Hall, will immediately follow the lecture.

Moniz is a professor
of physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
where he has served on the faculty since 1973. He served
as undersecretary of the Department of Energy from October
1997 until January 2001.

His responsibilities
were focused principally on the DOE’s science and national
security programs, including maintaining the nuclear stockpile
and addressing nonproliferation challenges, particularly
the United States’ cooperative programs to secure nuclear
materials in Russia.

He also served
from 1995 to 1997 as associate director for science in the
Office of Science and Technology Policy in the Executive
Office of the President, where his responsibilities spanned
the physical, life and social and behavioral sciences, science
education and university-government partnerships.

At MIT, Moniz
has served as head of the Department of Physics and as director
of the Bates Linear Accelerator Center.

His principal
research contributions have been in theoretical nuclear
physics, particularly in advancing nuclear reaction theory
at high energy.

Moniz received
a bachelor’s degree in physics from Boston College,
a doctorate in theoretical physics from Stanford University
and honorary doctorates from the University of Athens and
the University of Erlangen-Nurenburg.

Moniz is a Fellow
of the American Association for the Advancement of Science,
the Humboldt Foundation and the American Physical Society
and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

He received the
1998 Seymour Cray HPCC Industry Recognition Award for vision
and leadership in advancing scientific simulation.