Steven Chu

Steven Chu (born February 28, 1948)[2] is an American experimental physicist. He is known for his research in laser cooling and trapping of atoms, which won him the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1997.[2] His current research is concerned primarily with the study of biological systems at the single molecule level. He is currently Professor of Physics and Molecular and Cellular Biology of University of California, Berkeley and the director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. He has been designated Secretary of Energy-designate by President-elect Barack Obama.[3][4][5]

As global warming warnings grow more dire, Chu has pushed scientists at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and in industry to develop technologies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. He has joined the Copenhagen Climate Council,[6] an international collaboration between international business and science, established to create momentum for the United Nations COP-15 climate negotiations in Copenhagen in December 2009. Chief in Chu's campaign is an unprecedented research pact reached between UC Berkeley, oil industry giant BP, the Lawrence Berkeley Lab and the University of Illinois, which has drawn controversy as it will house industrial scientists at the public university.[7] Nearly US$400 million in new lab space will expand energy-related molecular work centered at Lawrence Berkeley that involves partners around the world. A US$160 million Energy Biosciences Institute Helios Building is to be funded by BP and subsidized with $70 million of California state funds. It will house up to 50 BP scientists in a private lab, and will include Chu's separate solar-energy program, but is reportedly on hold due to "geotechnical issues".[8]

Chu, a Chinese American, was born in St. Louis, Missouri and graduated from Garden City High School.[9] He received his bachelor’s degree in 1970 from the University of Rochester, and his doctorate degree from University of California, Berkeley in 1976. He remained at Berkeley as a postdoctoral researcher for two years before joining Bell Labs where he and his several co-workers carried out his Nobel Prize-winning laser cooling work. He left Bell Labs and became a professor of physics at Stanford University in 1987.[2] Chu served as the chair of the Physics Department at Stanford University from 1990 to 1993 and from 1999 to 2001. He was appointed as the director of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in 2004, during which time he also accepted a position as a Professor of Physics at the University of California, Berkeley.[4]

Chu, with three other professors, was involved with the Bio-X program in Stanford that is intended to bring together scientists from physics, chemistry, biology and engineering backgrounds under one roof in the James H. Clark Center. He also played an important role in securing the funding of the Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology at Stanford.

In December 2008, Chu was reportedly selected by President-elect Barack Obama to be nominated for the position of Secretary of Energy in his cabinet. If nominated and confirmed, Chu will be the first Chinese American to hold this office.[5]. However, he would be only the second Chinese-American member of a cabinet after Elaine Chao.

Steven Chu’s early research focused on atomic physics by developing laser cooling techniques and trap atoms using lasers. He expanded his research area to polymer physics and biophysics while he was at Stanford. His current research focuses on the study of biological molecules and systems at single molecular level. Many Ph.D. students and postdoctoral fellows from his group have become professors at research universities around the world.

Since 2004, Chu has been director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, which has 4,000 employees and a budget of $650 million. The laboratory under Chu has been a center of research into biofuels and solar energy technologies. Chu has been a vocal advocate for more research into alternative energy, arguing that a shift away from fossil fuels is essential to combat global warming.[10]

Steven Chu is a co-winner of Nobel Prize in Physics in 1997 “for development of methods to cool and trap atoms with laser light”, shared with Claude Cohen-Tannoudji and William Daniel Phillips. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Academia Sinica of Taiwan. He is a foreign member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Korean Academy of Sciences and Technology as well as a member of the Copenhagen Climate Council[11].

Steven Chu was one of 46 employees named in a 2006 PricewaterhouseCoopers audit of improper compensation practices at the University of California (including honoraria, supplemental vacation, moving expenses, sabbatical benefits and unqualified severance). [12] Records produced under the California Public Relations Act also show that he was one of at least 29 employees offered unusual perks in hiring letters (including a $50,000 signing bonus and an unusual boost in pension benefits), perks which the university had not made public.[13]

Chu married his wife Jean, an Oxford-trained physicist, in 1997. He comes from a family of accomplished scholars. His maternal grandfather earned advanced civil engineering degrees at Cornell and his uncle studied physics at the Sorbonne before they returned to China. His father earned an advanced chemical engineering degree at M.I.T. and taught at Washington University and Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute, while his mother studied economics.[2] His younger brother, Morgan Chu, is a partner and the former Co-Managing Partner at Irell & Manella LLP, a law firm.[14] His older brother Gilbert Chu is a professor and researcher of Biochemistry and Medicine at Stanford University. His two brothers and four cousins earned three M.D.s, four Ph.D.s, and a J.D. among them. Chu has two sons, Geoffrey and Michael from a previous marriage. [2]

Chu was the keynote speaker for Boston University's commencement ceremony on May 20, 2007. Chu is an early signatory to Project Steve, an educational campaign supporting the conventional scientific understanding of evolution.[15]

Besides his scientific career, he has also developed serious interest in various sports, including baseball, swimming and cycling. He taught himself tennis by reading a book in the eighth grade, and was a second-string substitute for the school team for three years. He also taught himself how to pole vault using bamboo poles obtained from the local carpet store.[2] A second-generation Chinese American, Chu has stated to journalists that he never learned to speak Chinese because his parents always talked to him and his siblings in English. [16]