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Wolfgang Ketterle and Rajeev J. Ram to be appointed
Associate Directors of RLE
Two RLE professors to succeed
David E. Pritchard and Jacob K. White
For Immediate Release
THURSDAY, 20 April 2006
Contact: William Smith, Assistant
Director for Finance and Sponsor
Relations
Phone: +1.617.253.5621
Email: whs@mit.edu
CAMBRIDGE, MA. 04.20.2006
Jeffrey H.
Shapiro, Director of the Research Laboratory
of Electronics (RLE) at the Massachusetts Institute
of Technology (MIT) and Julius A. Stratton Professor
of Electrical Engineering, has appointed Wolfgang
Ketterle,
John D. MacArthur Professor of Physics, and Rajeev
J. Ram, Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering,
to be Associate Directors of RLE effective 1 July 2006.
Professors Ketterle and Ram will succeed RLE's current
Associate Directors, David
E. Pritchard, Cecil and
Ida Green Professor of Physics, and Jacob
K. White,
Cecil H. Green Professor of Electrical Engineering
and Computer Science.
Professor Ketterle leads a group in RLE and its affiliated
Center for Ultracold
Atoms (CUA) that explores the
properties of ultracold gases. His research is in the
field of atomic physics and laser spectroscopy and
includes laser cooling and trapping, atom optics and
atom interferometry, and studies of Bose-Einstein condensation
and Fermi degeneracy. A major focus is the exploration
of new forms of matter, in particular novel aspects
of superfluidity, coherence, and correlations in many-body
systems. His observation of Bose-Einstein condensation
in a gas in 1995 and the first realization of an atom
laser in 1997 in RLE were recognized with the Nobel
Prize in Physics in 2001. This coming summer, Professor
Ketterle will also succeed Professor Daniel Kleppner,
Lester Wolfe Professor of Physics emeritus, as Director
of the CUA.
"Professor Ketterle is doing science of amazing
quality and quantity," said Professor Pritchard, "and
I am really happy that he has agreed to become an RLE
Associate Director. I am sure that this will preserve
and enhance the wonderful relationship between RLE
and the CUA."
Professor Ram leads a group in RLE concentrating on
physical optics and electronics, including the development
of novel components and systems for communications
and sensing, novel semiconductor lasers for advanced
fiber optic communications, and studies of fundamental
interactions between electronic materials and light.
He is also the Director of RLE's affiliated Center
for Integrated Photonic Systems (CIPS). CIPS aims to
provide leadership and direction for research and development
in photonics, to foster an MIT-wide community of researchers
in the field of integrated photonics and systems, and
to integrate member companies into the MIT photonics
community.
"Professor Ram brings both research expertise
and technical leadership experience to his new position
as an Associate Director of RLE," noted Professor
White. "He leads a world renowned research group
in integrated optics and nanophotonics, and as founder
of CIPS has brought together more than a dozen faculty
from a wide range of departments and laboratories at
MIT to work with leading industrial partners in the
field of photonics."
Professor Shapiro commented that, "RLE is now
in it sixtieth year. Throughout that time the Laboratory
has provided an outstanding environment for research
and learning. I thank Professors Pritchard and White
for their service to RLE, and I look forward to Professor
Ketterle's and Professor Ram's help in continuing this
tradition into an even greater future. Their investigations
and scholarship represent forefront efforts in RLE.
Working together, we can effectively represent the
remarkable intellectual diversity of this Laboratory."
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