Melba Newell Phillips was an American physicist and a pioneer science educator. One of the first doctoral students of J. Robert Oppenheimer at the University of California, Berkeley, Phillips completed her PhD in 1933, a time when few women could pursue careers in science. In 1935, Oppenheimer and Phillips published their description of the Oppenheimer–Phillips process, an early contribution to nuclear physics that explained the behavior of accelerated nuclei of radioactive hydrogen atoms. Phillips was also known for her refusal to cooperate with a U.S. Senate judiciary subcommittee's investigation on internal security during the McCarthy era which led to her dismissal from her professorship at Brooklyn College, where she was a professor of science from 1938 until 1952.
Dean is a title employed in academic administrations such as colleges or universities for a person with significant authority over a specific academic unit, over a specific area of concern, or both. In the United States and Canada, deans are usually university professors who serve as the heads of a university's constituent colleges and schools. Deans are common in private preparatory schools, and occasionally found in middle schools and high schools as well.
Persis S. Drell is the Provost Emerita and the James and Anna Marie Spilker Professor in the Stanford University School of Engineering, a professor of materials science and engineering, and a professor of physics. Prior to her appointment as provost, she was dean of the Stanford School of Engineering from 2014 to 2017 and director of the US Department of Energy’s SLAC National Acceleratory Laboratory from 2007 to 2012.
Jack M. Wilson is an American educator, entrepreneur and the President-Emeritus and Distinguished Professor of Higher Education, Emerging Technologies, and Innovation at the University of Massachusetts Lowell. During his career, he has served various institutions as professor of physics, department chair, research center director, dean, provost, vice president, and president, and has served with multiple professional societies and government committees.
Karen Hanson was the former Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost of the University of Minnesota. She previously served as Provost of the Bloomington campus of Indiana University and Executive Vice President of IU.
Helen Frances Gleeson OBE FInstP is a British physicist who specialises in soft matter and liquid crystals. She is Cavendish Professor and former Head of the School of Physics at the University of Leeds.
Mary Cunningham Boyce is a professor of engineering at Columbia University. She was provost of Columbia University from July 2021 to June 2023. Previously, she was dean of the Fu Foundation School of Engineering and Applied Science from 2013 to 2021.
Elizabeth H. Simmons is an American theoretical physicist, and Executive Vice Chancellor at University of California San Diego. Formerly, she was a distinguished professor of physics at Michigan State University, the dean of Lyman Briggs College, and the associate provost for faculty and academic staff development. She has also held positions at Harvard University and Boston University. Simmons is married to fellow physicist, R. Sekhar Chivukula. Together they have two children.
Kenneth Arthur Bloom is an American particle physicist. He is a full professor at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln and an Elected Fellow of the American Physical Society.
Janet Brown Guernsey, born Janet Brown, was a professor of physics at Wellesley College. She was active in the American Association of Physics Teachers and served as President from 1975 to 1976.
Heather Lewandowski is a professor of physics at the University of Colorado Boulder. She looks to understand the quantum mechanical processes in making chemical bonds. She uses time-varying inhomogeneous electric fields to achieve supersonic cooling. She also studies how students learn experimental skills in instructional physics labs and help to improve student learning in these environments. She is a Fellow of the American Physical Society.
Beth Ann Winkelstein is the Deputy Provost and the Eduardo D. Glandt President’s Distinguished Professor at the University of Pennsylvania. Winkelstein has established an active research program that is recognized for elucidating the mechanisms of subfailure cervical spine injuries and the cellular events surrounding the etiology of chronic pain. She is further recognized for longstanding contributions to the discipline of biomechanics and for mentoring many students that have followed into research active careers. Her research focuses on orthopaedic and musculoskeletal disorders, including developing innovative new pharmacological treatments and biomedical devices; the mechanisms of bodily injury, especially injuries from sports, automobile accidents, and/or degenerative diseases; and new treatments for spine and other joint injuries.
Marla Beth Feller is the Paul Licht Distinguished Professor in Biological Sciences and Member of the Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute at the University of California, Berkeley. She studies the mechanisms that underpin the assembly of neural circuits during development. Feller is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and member of the National Academy of Sciences.
Lillian Christie McDermott was an American physicist. In the early 1970s, McDermott established the Physics Education Group (PEG) at the University of Washington to "improve the teaching and learning of physics from kindergarten all the way through graduate school." She was recognized for her many contributions to the field of physics education research with an election to the American Physical Society in 1990.
Sarah C. Eno is an American experimental particle physicist at the University of Maryland, College Park, where she is a professor of physics and UMD Distinguished Scholar–Teacher. She has participated in several large experimental collaborations in high-energy physics, including the AMY experiment at the Japanese TRISTAN particle accelerator, the DØ experiment at Fermilab in the US, the Collider Detector at Fermilab, and the Compact Muon Solenoid experiment at the Large Hadron Collider in France and Switzerland.
Ximena Cid is a Chicana and Indigenous American physicist; physics educator and physics education researcher; and advocate for increasing diversity and supporting minority students in STEM and physics. She is currently associate professor and past chair of the physics department at California State University Dominguez Hills. She is recognized as the first Latina student, as well as the first Indigenous student, to earn a PhD in physics from the University of Texas at Arlington. She is also recognized as likely the first Indigenous person to chair a physics department in the country. One of her research specialties is 3-D simulations to support the comprehension of systems such as gravitational fields, electric fields and magnetic fields.
Robin Lillian Blumberg Selinger is an American materials scientist. She is professor of physics at Kent State University and the Advanced Materials and Liquid Crystal Institute. In 2016, Selinger became the first female Kent State University faculty member to be elected a Fellow of the American Physical Society.
Senta Victoria (Vicki) Greene is an American experimental high-energy physicist, the Stevenson Professor of Physics at Vanderbilt University, where she is also Director of Diversity, Equity, and Engagement for the College of Arts and Science. Her research involves the properties of the quark–gluon plasma, and the shapes of jets in heavy ion collisions.
Karen Beth Shipley Bjorkman is an American astronomer whose research applies polarimetry to the study of massive stars and circumstellar discs. She is Distinguished University Professor and Helen Luedtke Brooks Endowed Professor in Astronomy at the University of Toledo, and the university's provost and executive vice president for academic affairs.
Lena Michelle Hill is an American academic administrator serving as the provost of Washington and Lee University since 2021. She has worked as a professor of English and Africana studies and is an expert on Ralph Ellison.
