SAA NEWSLETTER Standards Alumni Association National Institute of Standards and Technology Gaithersburg, MD 20899-0952
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SAA NEWSLETTER Standards Alumni Association National Institute of Standards and Technology Gaithersburg, MD 20899-0952 Vol. 32, No. 2 Founding President: Churchill Eisenhart (1913–1994) June 2016 What’s Up at NIST? The guest speaker at the annual SAA Spring Luncheon ulatory role, but NIST strives to be the pre-eminent expert, was Dr. Willie May, Director of NIST and Undersecre- not the cop and Dr. May believes it should remain so. tary of Commerce for Standards and Technology. In a Staffing wide-ranging presentation entitled “What’s Up at NIST,” In filling the position of the NIST Principal Deputy Dr. May provided an overview of the state of NIST pro- and Associate Director for Laboratory Programs the search grams, budget, facilities, and recent news headlines. focused on someone who: (1) truly understands NIST and Dr. May opened his presentation with comments that its Mission; (2) is open-minded and outcome oriented; he was pleased to be able to speak to the SAA members. (3) has demonstrated a willingness to lead strategically; He said that he had flown home on a red-eye the previous (4) is an excellent communicator; (5) is an advocate for night to be sure he could make it to the luncheon. continual improvement of support functions; (6) has well NIST is well known around the world and he is very recognized technical chops; and (7) has experience with proud to be its director. He said that he has come to realize “crisis management.” There were six persons interviewed. that the NIST brand has a greater value than NBS ever Dr. Kent Rochford was selected for the position (see the had—”Congress sees who we are” and what we do; and March SAA Newsletter, the Visiting Committee now includes business leaders as Facilities and Staffing well as technical leaders. NIST has two large research campuses—Gaithersburg: NIST is a “world class scientific and technical agency” 62 buildings, 578 acres and Boulder: 26 buildings, 262 and there is “no one close to us” in terms of an “excellent acres. It has partnerships in every state—60 Manufactur- staff who are totally loyal to the organization.” NIST has ing Extension Services and ten Joint Institutes/Centers of “a great and unique mission.” It is “a key player on the Excellence. NIST staff numbers 3,400 federal employees Administration’s Innovation Team; it is the nation’s go-to- and 3,700 Guest Researchers and Associates (64 percent agency for measurements, standards and technology; and domestic and 36 percent foreign) from academia, industry it is receiving bipartisan and bicameral support...Since our and government. Over 400 NIST staff participate on about inception as the National Bureau of Standards in 1901, in 1000 standards committees. addition to maintaining the more traditional national phys- Budget and Programs ical measurement standards, we have also focused a signif- The FY2016 appropriations of $964M provide $690M icant portion of our resources and measurement activities for the NIST labs, $155M for Industrial Technology on addressing contemporary societal needs.” Services, and $119M for construction of research facili- In 1901, NBS supported the industrial revolution—in- ties. Additional 2016 funding for the labs includes about teroperability of fire-hose screw threads, light-bulb stan- $120M in other agency funding and another $50M from dards, standards for iron and steel works, and cooperation reimburseable services. Thus, the FY2016 funding for the with the ICC to reduce railroad accidents. NIST Laboratory programs totals about $860M. The seven Today, NIST is a leader in advanced communications, NIST Laboratories address three major areas: advanced manufacturing, bioscience and health, climate • Metrology (MML and PML), assessment, cyber-physical systems, cybersecurity, di- • Technology (EL, ITL, CTL), and saster resilience, forensic science, and quantum science. • National User Facilities (CNST, NCNR and part of CTL). Some groups are pushing for NIST to take on a more reg- Announcement–Member Directory, p.3; Retirements, p.18; INSIDE THIS ISSUE: Tributes–Mickey Haynes (p.28) and John W Cahn (p.32); SAA Awards and P.G. Gallery, p.35; Communications, p.36. 2 June 2016 SAA NEWSLETTER For the past several years during the budgetary growth CONTENTS spurt, the increase in STRS funds was more than sufficient to cover Congressional Priorities built into the funding. WHAT’S UP AT NIST? ....................................................... 1 For FY2016, however, while there was an increase of about $14.5M, Congress specified $39M in congressional 1. SAA PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE ................................... 3 priorities. In addition inflationary costs across NIST will be about $16.8M. The President has proposed significant 2. JULY 21 QUARTERLY MEETING ............................. 4 increases for the FY2017 but at this point they are not ex- 3. APRIL 28 ANNUAL MEETING REPORT .................. 4 pected to materialize. (see Management and Admin News on page 9 for the latest budget news). 4. NEWS FROM NIST ...................................................... 4 The NIST Advanced Manufacturing Program is build- Technical News (8 articles, pp 4–9); Mgmt & Admin ing a national network for manufacturing innovation. This News (p.9); Standards and Technology News (p.13); year NIST is investing $170M in advanced manufacturing Extramural Programs News (p.15); Information research in areas including: advanced materials, “smart” Technology Research News (p.15) Retirements (p.18). manufacturing. 3D-printing/additive manufacturing, light- weighting, nanomanufacturing, synthetic biology/biomau- 5. NIST STAFF HONORS AND AWARDS ..................... 17 facturing, and digital thread. The NIST Center for Neutron Research in 2015 had 6. BOULDER BABBLE..................................................... 18 2,436 research participants from 37 government labs and from 41 states, 50 corporations and 183 universities. The 7. OBITUARIES ................................................................ 21 Center for Nanoscale Science and Technology has more Abrams,* Ambrose, Bremer, Butters,* Duckworth, than 2,000 research participants each year from over 450 Fletcher,* Greenfeld, Hamilton, Lilley, Lykke, Maloney, collaborating organizations. Medlock, Raby, Ring, Rumfelt, Spencer. Joint Institutes and Centers for Excellence NIST “more than doubles our research talent through 8. TRIBUTES ..................................................................... 28 on-campus research collaboration.” The Joint Institutes William “Mickey” Haynes* and Centers For Excellence leverage the nation’s best ex- John W. Cahn* perts in science and technology. The National Cybersecurity Center of Excellence is 9. NEWS OF ALUMNI ..................................................... 35 a new model of cooperation that is accelerating the deploy- Gallagher; Prabhakar ment and use of secure, standards-based technology. The Center, a partnership between NIST, Montgomery County, 10. ASSOCIATION NEWS ............................................... 35 the State of Maryland and 22 industry partners is located SAA Awards; Portrait Gallery - 2016 Selections; Education Committee Report. about three miles from NIST’s Gaithersburg campus. (see page 21 of the March SAA Newsletter.) 11. COMMUNICATIONS .................................................. 36 The National Forensic Science Center of Excellence, “In Memory of Dr. Bryan Kibble”–Belecki hosted by Iowa State University held its kickoff meeting “Churchill Eisenhart”–Hoffman in Ames, IA last October. Other partners in the Center are “AVS Special Section on John Yates”–Gadzuk Carnegie Mellon University, the University of California, “Thank You”–Geoff Hudson Irvine, and the University of Virginia. The five other Joint Institutes are: (1) Joint Institute 12. HISTORY ...................................................................... 38 for Laboratory Astrophysics, (2) Institute for Bioscience “The Watt Balance”–Belecki and Biotechnology Research, (3) Hollings Marine Lab- “Pies and People”–Schooley oratory, (4) Joint Quantum Institute, (5) Joint Center for Quantum Information and Computer Science; and (6) Joint Initiative for Metrology in Biology. There are two additional Centers of Excellence: Center for Hierarchical Materials Design; and Center for Risk- Based Community Resilience Planning. This newsletter is published quarterly by the Standards Alumni Association for its membership and the staff of the National Institute of Standards and Technology. Its content is the responsibility of the SAA and contributors to the newsletter. The newsletter is not a publication of the U.S. government and should not be taken as reflecting either policies of NIST or opinions of the NIST management and staff members unless explicitly so stated. Items taken from NIST publications have been edited to comply with the newsletter’s editorial policies on staff recognition, brevity and language usage. SAA NEWSLETTER June 2016 3 Security The explosion in Building 236 (Gaithersburg campus) IMPORTANT NOTICE on July 18, 2015 (see SAA Newsletter, September, 2015) and its aftermath resulted in a major investigation of NIST A new printed copy of the SAA Membership Directory police by the House Science Committee that is having an is being prepared. It will be sent to each Member via impact on the security environment on both the Gaithers- U.S. Mail in the near future. burg and Boulder campuses. As reported in the March SAA Newsletter, the group Watch for it in your mailbox! of three highly respected security experts