Eugene David Commins (July 1, 1932 – September 26, 2015) was an American physicist and professor of physics at the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...

. He was named a member of the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, NGO, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the ...

in 1987. He was also a fellow of the

American Association for the Advancement of Science The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is a United States–based international nonprofit with the stated mission of promoting cooperation among scientists, defending scientific freedom, encouraging scientific responsib ...

, the

American Physical Society The American Physical Society (APS) is a not-for-profit membership organization of professionals in physics and related disciplines, comprising nearly fifty divisions, sections, and other units. Its mission is the advancement and diffusion of ...

, and a member of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (The Academy) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and other ...

Career

Born in New York City, Commins finished his Ph.D. at

Columbia University Columbia University in the City of New York, commonly referred to as Columbia University, is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Churc ...

in 1958 under Nobel Prize laureate Polykarp Kusch. After serving as a research physicist at the Columbia Radiation Lab, he joined the physics department at Berkeley in 1960 as an assistant professor. He became associate professor in 1965 and full professor in 1969. Commins also served as the chair of the department from 1972 to 1974 and was named professor emeritus in 2005. Commins and a group of his students were among the first to observe atomic

parity violation In physics, a parity transformation (also called parity inversion) is the flip in the sign of ''one'' spatial coordinate. In three dimensions, it can also refer to the simultaneous flip in the sign of all three spatial coordinates (a point ref ...

, a subtle effect of the fundamental

weak interaction In nuclear physics and particle physics, the weak interaction, weak force or the weak nuclear force, is one of the four known fundamental interactions, with the others being electromagnetism, the strong interaction, and gravitation. It is th ...

s. These experiments confirmed the Weinberg- Salam- Glashow model of

electroweak interaction In particle physics, the electroweak interaction or electroweak force is the unified description of two of the fundamental interactions of nature: electromagnetism (electromagnetic interaction) and the weak interaction. Although these two force ...

which is at the core of the

Standard Model The Standard Model of particle physics is the Scientific theory, theory describing three of the four known fundamental forces (electromagnetism, electromagnetic, weak interaction, weak and strong interactions – excluding gravity) in the unive ...

and for which the three theorists were awarded the

Nobel Prize in Physics The Nobel Prize in Physics () is an annual award given by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences for those who have made the most outstanding contributions to mankind in the field of physics. It is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the ...

in 1979. Besides being a distinguished researcher, Commins was also known for being a great teacher and mentor of future physicists. His most famous student is

Steven Chu Steven Chulaser cooling Laser cooling includes several techniques where atoms, molecules, and small mechanical systems are cooled with laser light. The directed energy of lasers is often associated with heating materials, e.g. laser cutting, so it can be counterintuit ...

and served as

U.S. Secretary of Energy The United States secretary of energy is the head of the United States Department of Energy, a member of the Cabinet of the United States and fifteenth in the presidential line of succession. The position was created on October 1, 1977, when Pr ...

during the

Obama administration Barack Obama's tenure as the 44th president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 2009, and ended on January 20, 2017. Obama, a Democrat from Illinois, took office following his victory over Republican nomine ...

. Another student, Persis Drell, became director of the

SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, originally named the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, is a Federally funded research and development centers, federally funded research and development center in Menlo Park, California, Menlo Park, Ca ...

. Many of his other students became prominent researchers in fields ranging from nuclear and particle physics to

atomic, molecular, and optical physics Atomic, molecular, and optical physics (AMO) is the study of matter–matter and light–matter interactions, at the scale of one or a few atoms and energy scales around several electron volts. The three areas are closely interrelated. AMO th ...

at top institutions all around the United States. These students include Hyatt Gibbs, Frank Calaprice,

Stuart Freedman Stuart Jay Freedman (January 13, 1944 – November 10, 2012) was an American physicist, known for his experiment testing Bell's inequality proposed to him by John Clauser at the University of California, Berkeley as well as for his contributions ...

, Phillip Bucksbaum, Larry Hunter, Carol Tanner,

David DeMille David P. DeMille is an American physicist and Professor of Physics at the University of Chicago. He is best known for his use of polar diatomic molecules to search for symmetry-violating effects within the molecules and as a means for manipula ...

, Dmitry Budker, and Chris Regan. Although he retired in 2001 he remained active in the department, continuing to teach and informally mentor Physics department students. That same year, colleagues, friends and former students gathered to honor him with the "ComminsFest Symposium." The two-day event featured talks on Commins' past and present scientific interests and highlighted his passion for music and art. It featured an array of distinguished speakers, most of whom traced their academic lineage to Commins. The conference proceedings, Art and Symmetry in Experimental Physics was published shortly thereafter. In 2014, Commins authored the book, Quantum Mechanics: an Experimentalist's Approach, an outgrowth of lecture notes he developed while teaching Physics 221AB frequently between 1965 and 2010.

Legacy

As a testament to his worldwide impact in mentoring graduate students,

Steven Chu Steven Chu

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Commins, Eugene D. University of California, Berkeley College of Letters and Science faculty American physicists 2015 deaths Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science Fellows of the American Physical Society 1932 births Columbia University alumni