Geophysicist, Educator to be New Chair of Physics Board

(College Park, MD) -- The American Institute of Physics has named geophysicist Louis J. Lanzerotti of the New Jersey Institute of Technology as the new chair of AIP’s Governing Board. He will replace MIT’s Mildred Dresselhaus, who is stepping down as chair at the end of March 2008. Lanzerotti said he was extremely honored to be elected Chair by the Governing Board, and “looks forward to continuing Professor Dresselhaus’ example of strong leadership and of working closely with AIP management and the member societies to strengthen physics- and astronomy-related research and service in the nation.”

Lanzerotti, currently principal investigator on an instrument for the NASA Radiation Belts Storm Probes mission and a member of the board that oversees the National Science Foundation, has had diverse experience and accomplishments in research, education, outreach, and science policy.

He is currently serving a six-year appointment on the National Science Board, the latest in a series of appointments on NSF and NASA committees and advisory bodies over the last 35 years.

He has performed extensive volunteer service with a wide range of government and nonprofit institutions dedicated to the service of science, including AIP, the American Geophysical Union, and the American Physical Society. He was a founding editor of the journal Space Weather: The International Journal of Research and Applications.

He has spent several decades in the Antarctic studying the Earth’s upper atmosphere and space environments. There is an asteroid named after him (Minor Planet 5504 Lanzerotti), as well as Mount Lanzerotti, the latter in recognition of his research in the Antarctic.

He is also active locally. In the 1980s, Lanzerotti ran for the local school board in Harding Township, New Jersey, winning election to three consecutive three-year terms. He is currently serving as the township’s mayor through 2007.

Lanzerotti’s scientific research has primarily focused on space plasmas, geophysics, and engineering problems in atmospheric and space processes, as well as geomagnetism and solid earth geophysics as it applies to the design and operation of spacecraft and cable communication systems.

He helped develop instruments for many NASA spaceflight missions in Earth’s magnetosphere, interplanetary space, and the outer planets, including instruments for Voyager I and II, Cassini, and developing instruments for both the orbiter and atmosphere entry probe for the Galileo mission.

AIP is an organization that must respond to and represent the interests of many customers, namely, its 10 member societies and the 130,000 members of the physical science community within those societies,” said AIP Executive Director and CEO H. Frederick Dylla, who expressed his appreciation for “the support of a wise and experienced Chair of the Governing Board. I feel fortunate to have overlapped with Dr. Dresselhaus’ final year as chair, given her wide experience as a scientist, teacher and leader of prestigious scientific organizations."Dylla has known Lanzerotti for more than 25 years, when he heard him lecture to a group of high school students in New Jersey about spacecraft observations. Over the ensuing years, the two men served together on the AIP Governing Board and other advisory committees.

Born in Carlinville, Illinois, Lanzerotti earned an undergraduate degree in engineering from the University of Illinois before pursuing graduate studies in physics at Harvard University. He earned his PhD in 1965 and spent two years as a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard and Bell Laboratories before joining the latter’s technical staff. He is currently a Distinguished Professor of Physics in NJIT’s Center for Solar-Terrestrial Research, and serves as a consultant to Alcatel-Lucent.

The American Institute of Physics is a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit membership corporation created for the purpose of promoting the advancement and diffusion of the knowledge of physics and its application to human welfare. It is the mission of the Institute to serve the sciences of physics and astronomy by serving its member societies, by serving individual scientists, and by serving students and the general public.