Explorers

Gordon Randolph Willey (1913 - 2002) was an American archaeologist famous for his fieldwork in South and Central America as well as the southeastern United States. Regarded as one of the leading figures in 20th-century archaeology, Willey had a profound influence on the development and practice of archaeology in the Americas and has been described by colleagues as the "dean" of New World archaeology. A graduate of the University of Arizona and with a doctorate from Columbia, he conducted surveys and excavations in Peru, Ecuador, Panama, Guatemala, Honduras, Belize and the Southeastern United States. In 1953, he published the classic Prehistoric Settlement Patterns in the Viru Valley, which formed the basis for the settlement pattern studies which are a cornerstone of contemporary archaeology. He later published Method and Theory in American Archaeology, the first systematic summary of the discipline. For much of his career, he was the Senior Professor in Anthropology at Harvard University's Peabody Museum. His confident assertion that "archaeology is anthropology or it is nothing" is the implicit and explicit basis for advances in the field which have followed. Of his more than 30 books and monographs, the crowning achievement may be Introduction to American Archeology, a masterful synthesis of the archeology of North, Central and South America. In this address to the Academy of Achievement, recorded at the Academy's 1987 Summit in Scottsdale, Arizona, Professor Willey discusses his career as an archaeologist and reflects on the nature of archaeology and its relationship to history, and social, philosophical and political issues.

The American chemist Dudley Herschbach received the 1986 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for contributions including his "crossed molecular beam" experiments that have yielded a molecular-level understanding of elementary chemical reactions, such as those used in the synthesis of drugs, plastics and industrial chemicals. Professor Herschbach addressed the Academy of Achievement at its 1987 Summit in Scottsdale, Arizona. In this podcast, he relates how, as a small child, he was first inspired to pursue a career in science and became the first member of his family to pursue higher education. He also discusses the molecular basis of chemical reactions and the significance of his own research. Today, he is a Professor of Physics at Texas A&M University , and continues his long relationship with Harvard University where he is Professor Emeritus. To date, he has published over 400 research papers. He continues to pursue research at the frontiers of molecular chemistry.

Dr. Leroy Hood is the Co-founder and President of the Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle and one of the world's leading scientists in molecular biotechnology and genomics. He received the Lemelson-MIT Prize for inventing "four instruments that have unlocked much of the mystery of human biology" by helping decode the genome. Hood also won the Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research for inventing the automated DNA sequencer and an automated tool for synthesizing DNA. A pillar in the field of biotechnology, Hood has played a role in founding fourteen major biotechnology companies, including Amgen, Applied Biosystems, Darwin, and Integrated Diagnostics. Hood grew up in Shelby, Montana in a family of engineers and researchers. In high school, he worked with a team to map a Wyoming anticline (a geological formation featuring layers of rock that bulge up out of the earth). He entered his results, which showed what had led to the buildup of oil in the anticline, in the 1956 Westinghouse Science Talent Search, and was named a finalist. When he left to go to Washington, D.C. for the finals, the high school band came down to the train station and played. He went on to the California Institute of Technology, then to Johns Hopkins Medical School, where he became immersed in the new field of immunology. Hood returned to Caltech and over the next few decades, developed a protein sequencer, which tells scientists which amino acids make up a given protein; a protein sequencer, which tells scientists which amino acids make up a given protein; a peptide synthesizer, which puts those amino acids together to form proteins; and an automated DNA sequencer, which gives scientists the genetic letters that spell out a given gene. The last was critical because it allowed scientists to gather information much more quickly. By the time the DNA sequencer made the Human Genome Project possible in the late 1990s, scientists were mapping genes at thousands of times the rate that they had done two decades before. Hood's vision and inventions had permanently influenced the course of biology and revolutionized the understanding of genetics, life and human health. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, and the Institute of Medicine, one of only 10 people in the world to be elected to all three academies. Hood has also received 17 honorary degrees from universities around the world. In 2007, he was elected to the Inventor's Hall of Fame. Dr. Leroy Hood participated in the 1987 Achievement Summit in Scottsdale, Arizona and spoke to the student delegates about his life-long fascination with molecular structures, technology, and the immune system.

The American astronomer Robert W. Wilson received the 1978 Nobel Prize in physics for his discovery of cosmic microwave background radiation (CMB). Dr. Wilson was at work on a new type of antenna for Bell Laboratories in Holmdel, New Jersey, when he sought to identify a source of noise in the atmosphere that could not be otherwise explained. After eliminating all other potential sources, the noise was finally identified as CMB radiation, a lingering echo of the Big Bang, the cataclysmic explosion that created the known universe. Wilson, born in Houston, Texas, joined Bell labs after earning a physics degree at Rice University and a doctorate from Caltech. He was promoted to head pf Radio Physics Research at Bell, where he continued his work developing the techniques of radio spectroscopy to unprecedented levels of accuracy, studying the molecular composition of interstellar clouds and making significant contributions to the technology of satellite communications. In this address to the Academy of Achievement, recorded at the 1987 Summit in Scottsdale, Arizona, he tells the students about his own career in physics and radioastronomy. He also outlines the evolution of cosmology since the 1920s, and discusses the development of the universe since the Big Bang.

Dr. Burton Richter is the Director Emeritus of the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC) and a recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physics. He was born into a Jewish family in Brooklyn and raised in the Queens neighborhood of Far Rockaway. Richter earned both his bachelor's degree and his doctorate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. As a professor at Stanford University, he built a particle accelerator called SPEAR (Stanford Positron-Electron Asymmetric Ring) with the support of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission. With it he led a team that discovered a new subatomic particle he call a psi. A team led by Samuel Ting at Brookhaven National Laboratory also made this discovery, but he called the particle J. The particle became know as the psi-J meson. This discovery (made on November 11, 1974) was part of the "November Revolution" of particle physics. The importance of this discovery is highlighted by the subsequent, rapid changes in high-energy physics at the time. Burton Richter and Samuel Ting were jointly awarded the 1976 Nobel Prize in Physics for their work. From 1984 to 1999, Burton Richter was the director of the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, operated by Stanford University. The facility is located on 426 acres of Stanford-owned land on Sand Hill Road in Menlo Park, California, and employs over 10,000 people. The main accelerator is two miles long, the longest linear accelerator in the world. This podcast was recorded at the 1987 Achievement Summit in Scottsdale, Arizona and Burton Richter addressed the Academy student delegates about his life-long passion for particle physics.

Freeman Dyson is an internationally renowned theoretical physicist, mathematician and author, esteemed for his work in quantum field theory, solid-state physics, astronomy and nuclear engineering. Beyond his theoretical work at the outer edges of human knowledge, he has been deeply involved in the most contentious public issues involving science and technology, from nuclear disarmament, to space travel and climate change. Born in Crowthorne, England, he was fascinated by mathematics, astronomy and writing form his earl childhood. He published his first important mathematical papers while still an undergraduate at Cambridge. After serving with the research section of the Royal Air Force Bomber Command during World War II, he moved to the U.S. to pursue research in theoretical physics. Since 1953, he has carried out his work at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. In addition to his scholarly works, he has published a number of highly entertaining books for the general reader. Weapons and Hope, his 1984 bestseller on "nuclear arms and the human predicament" received the 1985 National Book Critics Circle Award. More recent books include: Origins of Life; The Sun, the Genome and the Internet; The Scientist as Rebel; and A Many Colored Glass: Reflections on the Place of Life in the Universe. In this audio podcast, recorded at the Academy of Achievement's 1986 Summit in Washington, D.C., he discusses his career in physics and his love of writing. He also shares memories of two of his best friends, the physicist Richard Feynman and the molecular biologist Sir Francis Crick. He encourages the Academy's student delegates to be alert to new opportunities, and be ready to change courses if called upon.

Isidor Isaac Rabi (1898-1988) was born in Rymanow, Poland, at that time part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and immigrated with his family to the United States in the first year of his life. After earning a Ph.D. in physics at Columbia University, he went to Europe, where the twin revolutions of relativity and quantum mechanics were transforming our understanding of the universe. In Europe, he studied and worked alongside Erwin Schrodinger, Niels Bohr, Werner Heisenberg and the other titans of modern physics. Returning to the United States, he took up a professorship at Columbia, where he was to remain for most of his career, training successive generations of scientists. In 1944 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for his application of the resonance method to the measurement of the magnetic properties of atomic nuclei. His discoveries were fundamental to the development of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) for internal medicine and to the creation of the laser and atomic clock. During World War II, he directed the Radiation Laboratory in Cambridge, Massachusetts, refining radar technology. As a visiting consultant with the Manhattan Project, he witnessed the detonation of the first atom bomb. After the war, he served as science advisor to President Truman, and was one of the founders of the Brookhaven National Laboratory and of the European Centre for Nuclear Research (CERN). As Chairman of the Columbia Physics Department, he oversaw the work of distinguished physicists such as Charles Townes and Leon Lederman. A beloved figure in the world of science, he received numerous awards for his commitment to the peaceful uses of atomic energy.

Herbert A. Hauptman pioneered and developed a mathematical method that has changed the entire field of chemistry and opened a new era in research in determination of molecular structures of crystallized materials. He graduated from City College of New York and obtained a master's in mathematics from Columbia in 1939. After World War II, he collaborated with Jerome Karle at the Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, D.C. The combination of mathematics and physical chemistry expertise enabled them to tackle the phase problem of X-ray crystallography. By 1955, Hauptman received his doctorate in mathematics, and they laid the foundations of the direct methods in X-ray crystallography. In 1970, he joined the Medical Foundation of Buffalo where he was Research Director. He authored over 170 publications. He currently serves as President of the Hauptman-Woodward Medical Research Institute. In 1985, Dr. Hauptman shared with Dr. Jerome Karle, the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. The next year, Dr. Herbert Hauptman addressed the student delegates at the 1986 Achievement Summit in Washington, D.C. about scientific research and discovery.

Jerome Karle, born Jerome Karfunkel, was awarded the 1985 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for developing revolutionary mathematical techniques through which X-ray crystallography can be used to deduce the three-dimensional structure of natural substances vital to the internal chemistry of the human body. He started college at age 15 and earned his degree from the City College of New York in 1937. Karle received his master's degree in biology from Harvard the next year. In 1940, he enrolled at the University of Michigan and received his doctorate, and starting in 1943, after completing his studies, Karle worked on the famed Manhattan Project at the University of Chicago with his wife Dr. Isabella Karle, one of the youngest scientists and few women on the project. In 1946, they moved to Washington, D.C. to work for the Naval Research Laboratory. Karle and Dr. Herbert Hauptman were jointly awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their work at the laboratory, using X-ray scattering techniques to determine the structure of crystals, which is used to study the biological, chemical, and metallurgical characteristics of substances. This technique has played a major role in the development of new pharmaceutical products and other synthesized materials. On July 23, 2009, Dr. Karle and his wife retired from the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory after a combined 127 years of service. At the retirement ceremony, the couple was presented with the U.S. Navy's Distinguished Service Award. Dr. Jerome Karle addressed the student delegates at the 1986 Achievement Summit about his journey from bright science student in Brooklyn to internationally pre-eminent researcher.

Dr. Herbert W. Boyer and Robert A. Swanson (1947 - 1999) co-founded Genentech in 1976 and launched the biotechnology revolution. It remains one of the leading biotech companies in the world. Boyer was a Professor of Biochemistry and Genetics at the University of California Medical School at San Francisco whose pioneering research in gene-splicing paved the way to a new age of man-made wonders.Swanson was a graduate of MIT Sloan School of Management who became a venture capitalist. After reading about Boyer's controversial gene-splicing discovery, Swanson placed a telephone call to Boyer's laboratory, and Boyer offered Swanson ten minutes on a Friday afternoon. Bob Swanson's ten-minute audience with Herb Boyer lasted several hours, and they fed each other's excitement and they left for a local saloon. Many beers later, each had agreed to put up $500 to form a partnership to exploit recombinant DNA technology. Without any initial financial help, Swanson rented a small office in downtown San Francisco, and working closely with Boyer, he developed the business plan for the company he hoped to found. The scientist drafted proposals for the technical end of the operation and the venture capitalist wrote out marketing schemes, and they revised and merged their work as they went along. In April 1976, Boyer and Swanson dissolved their $1,000 partnership and incorporated their enterprise under an abbreviation for "genetic engineering technology" - Genentech. Without any employees of its own, without facilities, without anything but a name and a promising technology, Genentech was born. The company soon became the catalyst of the genetic revolution, a symbol of the awesome commercial potential of biotechnology, and Biotech's "first superstar." Herb Boyer went on receive the Albert Lasker Award, the highest honor in American medicine, for his pioneering research in gene-splicing and donated $10 million to the Yale School of Medicine, where he spent three years in post-graduate work. Robert Swanson was inducted into the U.S. Business Hall of Fame and died, in 1999, at the age of 52, from brain cancer. Genentech was purchased by the pharmaceutical conglomerate Hoffmann-La Roche in 2009 for nearly $47 billion and employs 11,000 people in the Bay Area. Herbert Boyer and Robert Swanson addressed the student delegates at the 1986 Achievement Summit in Washington, D.C. and spoke about their pioneering work and launching the biotechnology revolution. For many years, Herbert Boyer was the Board Chairman of the American Academy of Achievement.