Barry Clark Barish

Barry C. Barish is the Ronald and Maxine Linde Professor Emeritus of Physics at the California Institute of Technology. His work in experimental high-energy physics opened several approaches that helped to establish the standard model of particle physics. He helped develop the study of lepton pairs in hadronic interactions. Barish performed experiments involving high-energy neutrino beams, which helped establish the quark structure of nucleons and provided evidence for the existence of weak neutral currents. He has lead the effort to detect gravitational waves through the construction and operation of the Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory (LIGO). Among his noteworthy experiments were those performed at Fermilab using high-energy neutrino collisions to reveal the quark substructure of the nucleon. In the 1980s, Barish initiated an international effort to build a sophisticated underground detector (MACRO) in Italy in the emerging field of particle astrophysics. The experiments conducted underground in Italy provided the best limits on the density of Grand Unified magnetic monopoles and some of the key evidence that neutrinos have mass. Barish became Principal Investigator of the Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory (LIGO) project in 1994 and served as Director of the LIGO Laboratory from 1997 to 2005. He is currently the Director of the Global Design Effort for the International Linear Collider (ILC). In 2003-09, Barish served on the National Science Board, which oversees the National Science Foundation (NSF) and advises the President and the Congress on policy issues related to science, engineering, and education. Barish served as President of the American Physical Society in 2011, and received honorary degrees from the University of Bologna in Italy (2006) and the University of Florida (2007).