Obituary of Ronald Sladek (1926-2012)

Ronald John Sladek, 85, Professor of Physics Emeritus at Purdue University, passed away on August 17, 2012 in Greensboro, North Carolina. Ron Sladek is remembered by his colleagues and his students as an excellent researcher, teacher, and mentor. He made many noteworthy contributions in the area of Condensed Matter Physics while working in industry as well as in academia. He worked closely with the students, assisting and directing them to gain the confidence to solve complicated problems. He taught his students using a unique approach to solving technical as well as analytical problems by the ab initio method. He continued to follow the progress of their careers, taking pride in their successes as well. Ron graduated from the J.S. Morton High School in Cecero, IL in 1944. He was a veteran of the US Navy and served in World War II. He enrolled in the University of Chicago, receiving a Ph.B degree in 1947, a B.S. in 1949, a M.S. in 1950 and a Ph.D. in 1954. As a graduate student in the Institute of Metals, he worked with Clarence Zener and carried out his Ph.D. dissertation research under John Hulm on the thermal conductivity of superconducting alloys. One cannot think of a better laboratory and mentors for being introduced to the state of the art problems in condensed matter physics at that time! After obtaining his Ph.D. in 1954, Ron accepted the offer to work at the Westinghouse Research Laboratories in Pittsburg on “Transport Properties in Semiconductors”. His papers with Robert W. Keyes on the “Effect of a Magnetic Field on Impurity Levels in InSb” and “Magnetically Induced Donor Impurity Banding in InSb” and “Magnetoresistance of High Purity InSb in the Quantum Limit” are much quoted contributions to semiconductor physics which was rapidly developing in the late 1950’s and early 1960’s.

In 1961, Ron accepted the position of Associate Professor of Physics at Purdue University, and was promoted to the position of Professor of Physics in 1966. He established a state-of-the-art experimental facility and carried out fundamental studies on Galvanomagnetic Effects: Piezo-thermal Conductivity; Thermoelectric Power; Piezo-resistance and Piezo-Hall effects. To cite some illustrative examples, his work in Magnetoresistance studies on Phonon-assisted Hopping Conduction range at high magnetic fields and Magnetically-induced Spin Reversal Transitions in impurity conduction of n-type Germanium, are significant contributions to semiconductor physics. Furthermore, Ron expanded the range of his experimental methods by including ultrasonic techniques and investigating the materials systems that were grown in the Departments of Physics and Chemistry at Purdue University. Examples of some of these materials are: Diluted Magnetic Semiconductors (DMSs); Oxides; Amorphous As2S3 and AS2Se3;…the list continues! A total of 104 publications resulted from this prolific effort.

From the time Ron joined the Purdue Physics Department in 1961 until he retired as an Emeritus Professor in 1991, Ron introduced 21 graduate students to the discipline of experimental physics, along with its rigors and pleasures. During his career, he presented many contributed and invited talks at the American Physical Society meetings. He was also invited to give many talks at international conferences. Throughout his years at Purdue, Ron assumed a variety of committee responsibilities while maintaining a full scale research program, e.g. Chairmanship of the Advanced Research Agency’s Interdisciplinary Laboratory at Purdue; Acting Head, Department of Physics, September 1967-January 1971; Associate Dean of Science July 1974-June 1987. He worked on Sabbaticals in California at North American Rockwell Corporation in Thousand Oaks in 1967 and at Xerox Research Center in Palo Alto in 1976-77. Ron was elected Fellow of the American Physical Society, as a testimonial to his many contributions in Condensed Matter Physics.

Upon his retirement, a “Sladek Symposium”, was organized at Purdue in April 1991. The celebration brought together most of his former graduate students and research associates from all over the world. Ron is survived by his wife of 59 years, Jeanne Sladek, and their children (Linda, James, Frances, Stephen, Rosemarie, and Edward) along with 14 grandchildren.