A Resonant Life

I embody the quintessential Californian spirit: Raised in Los Angeles, I spent weekends either at the beach or skiing at Big Bear, rode motorcycles, hiked the Sierras, and cherished the sounds of the Beach Boys and Creedence Clearwater Revival. Restless, undisciplined, and irreverent, I applied to only one college—UC Santa Barbara—mainly because that is where my high school friends were going. Although we like to think our intellect transcends culture, my childhood and teenage years were shaped by the rhythms of the 1960s: space flight, NASA, and virtually every episode of Star Trek (often watched multiple times). Unmoored, I entered college intending to major in biochemistry but drifted into chemistry while also immersing myself in the physics curriculum. I earned a PhD in chemical physics at Caltech, yet chose to work with a chemical engineer. When my thesis advisor was suddenly killed, I completed my dissertation at Xerox Palo Alto Research Center, working on solar cell materials alongside Cambridge-educated physicists. While my chemistry peers pursued academic postdocs, I went instead to IBM Yorktown Heights, dividing my time between silane reactor engineering and amorphous semiconductor physics. Would I ever become anchored? Here is the rest of the story that led to 43 years on the Berkeley faculty. Including motorcycles.