Steven Beckwith

Steven Van Walter Beckwith (born November 20, 1951 in Madison , Wisconsin ) is an American astronomer and has been the University of California's Vice President for Research and Graduate Studies and Professor of Astronomy since 2008 from the University of California, Berkeley .

Life

Beckwith studied Engineering Physics from Cornell University and received his PhD in Physics from the California Institute of Technology . After receiving his doctorate, he returned to Cornell, where he taught and researched as an assistant professor of astronomy for nearly 13 years. In 1982 he became a research fellow of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation ( Sloan Research Fellow ).

In 1991 he accepted a position as Scientific Member and Director at the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy (MPIA) in Heidelberg, where he stayed until 1998. In Heidelberg, among other things, he was responsible for the German-Spanish telescope on Calar Alto . In an interview that appeared in the MPIA's 2004 annual report, Beckwith strongly criticized the conditions for taking up work in Germany that his wife suffered from:

"Even after we were here for seven years, she could not achieve the status necessary for permanent employment. Although she was employed most of the time, first at IBM and later at SAP, the German government occasionally forced these companies to advertise her position and look for qualified German citizens who should do the job she was doing. (...) Compared to me, she was only a second-class citizen "

In 1998 Beckwith returned to the United States to become director of the Space Telescope Science Institute (STSI), which is responsible, among other things, for the operation of the Hubble space telescope . In 2005 Beckwith resigned from his position as director at STSI.

At STSI, he was responsible for the 600 employees, including around 100 doctoral students, and an annual budget of 25 million US dollars. At STSI, he ultimately campaigned successfully for the continuation of the Hubble mission: NASA decided in 2004 not to continue operating the telescope. Because of Beckwith's commitment to this decision, it was revised in 2006.

After stepping down as director of STSI, Beckwith became professor of physics and astronomy at Johns Hopkins University while remaining a Distinguished Research Scientist at the Space Telescope Science Institute. In 2008, he was named vice president of the University of California; the corresponding position was newly created at the UC.

His research is primarily concerned with the evolution of galaxies and extrasolar planetary systems and the formation of galaxies in the early universe. In 2004 he led the research group that created the Hubble Ultra Deep Field , the deepest view of the universe in visible light that has ever been achieved. His work comprises around 200 scientific papers, for which he has won several international awards. Since 2002 he has been an "External Scientific Member" of the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy , and in 2004 he was elected a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences .

Beckwith is married to the scientist Susan McCormick; the couple have two children together.

Prizes and awards (selection)

• Citation by Science Digest: one of the top 100 US scientists under 40 years of age (1984)
• Max Planck Research Award (1997)
• Regents' Lecturer, Astronomy and Physics, University of California

literature

• Max Planck Society (ed.): Handbook of Scientific Members: Handbook of Scientific Members . Max Planck Society, Munich 2000, p. 14

Web links

• Page about Beckwith at the University of California
• Page on Beckwith's Appointment to the University of California (Income Statement)
• Beckwith CV (PDF)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ See interview in the MPIA's 2004 annual report, page 125 under Archived copy ( Memento of the original from November 5, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.