Dr. Michael S. Turner - Chairman for the Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics

He also holds appointments in the Department of Physics and Enrico Fermi Institute at Chicago and is member of the scientific staff at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory. The recipient of numerous awards and distinctions during three decades of research, Dr. Turner is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and a fellow of the American Physical Society and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He has served on or chaired many advisory committees for the NRC, DOE, NSF and NASA, and since 1984 he has been involved in the governance of the Aspen Center for Physics, serving as President from 1989 to 1993. He currently serves on the Board of Trustees of the Illinois Math and Science Academy. He is the author of several monographs and books as well as more than 300 research papers. His research focuses on the earliest moments of the Universe. He has made important contributions to inflationary Universe theory, understanding of dark matter and the origin of structure. The National Science Foundation has recently named Dr. Michael S. Turner as Assistant Director for Mathematical and Physical Sciences, a position he will assume in the fall of 2003. Dr. Turner received his Ph.D. and M.S. degrees in physics from Stanford University and his B.S. degree in physics from the California Institute of Technology.