JASON Group | Part-time defense think tank for university professors

[Magda Hassan]

The JASON scholars are a select group of scientists who conduct studies for different parts of the U.S. government. The group is referred to as the JASON Defense Advisory Group or simply the JASON Group. Today their headquarters are located at the JASON Program Office at the MITRE Corporation, a not-for-profit federally funded research and development company.
JASON was founded in 1958-1959 by scientists as Sidney Drell, Kenneth Watson, John Wheeler, Charles Townes and Marvin Goldberger (1). It was created as a special part-time division within the newly-established Institute for Defense Analyses (IDA), a federally-funded academic think tank that acted as a counterweight to research done by the different military branches, private corporations and the CIA. According to the official history of IDA:
"IDA traces its roots to 1947, when Secretary of Defense James Forrestal established the Weapons Systems Evaluation Group (WSEG) to provide technical analyses of weapons systems and programs. In the mid-1950s, the Secretary of Defense [Charles E. Wilson] and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff [likely Admiral Radford] asked the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to form a civilian, nonprofit research institute. The Institute would operate under the auspices of a university consortium to attract highly qualified scientists to assist WSEG in addressing the nation's most challenging security problems... IDA only works for the government... IDA does not work directly for the military departments... IDA does not work for private industry." (2)
To provide a bit more detail: In 1956, James R. Killian Jr., president of the MIT Corporation and a close associate of Vannevar Bush, suggested to Eisenhower that the country's best scientific talents should be brought together in an effort to break all Russian encryption systems. In response, Eisenhower appointed Bell Labs president of research, Dr. William O. Baker, as head of a commission to see what could be done with Killian's proposal. In February 1957, the Baker Commission announced its support for Killian and one of the responses of Eisenhower and his secretary of defense, Charles E. Wilson*, was to ask Killian, as president of MIT, to set up the Institute for Defense Analyses, which was to be done in cooperation with such universities as Caltech, Columbia and Stanford. Vannevar Bush, who used to be vice president of MIT before the war, briefly returned to MIT to take the chairmanship, from 1957 to 1959.
* Wilson was CEO of General Motors and proposed a "permanent war economy" after WWII to prevent another great depression. Together with John Foster Dulles he had been responsible for picking the committee members that turned the Psychological Strategy Board into the Operations Coordinating Board.
The purpose of IDA was to take over WSEG from the Joint Chiefs of Staff and to supply it with new ideas and technology concepts. Killian became chairman of the board of trustees of IDA. Other early members of the think tank were Eric A. Walker, mainly associated with the Office of Naval Research, and later JASON scholar Charles H. Townes, who had recently co-invented the maser, the predecessor of the laser. Both became leading officers of IDA, just as General Maxwell D. Taylor and the CIA's Richard M. Bissell, Jr. in later years. Someone like Admiral Harry Train also became involved with IDA after his retirement, although only as a regular trustee. The official history of IDA continues:
"In 1958, at the request of the Secretary of Defense, IDA established a division to support the newly created Advanced Research Projects Agency. Shortly thereafter, the mandate of this division was broadened to include scientific and technical studies for all offices of the Director of Defense, Research and Engineering. Subsequent divisions were established to provide cost analyses, computer software and engineering, strategy and force assessments, and operational test and evaluation... Throughout its history, IDA also has assisted other federal agencies." (3)
Although several subsidiary groups were created within IDA, it is almost certain that the newly created division to support the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA; later DARPA) was the JASON Group. ARPA appears on JASON documents under the heading 'Controlling Office Name' and JASON was created in the same 1958-1959 time period. IDA also talks about the mandate of the division expanding to perform studies for the DoD and such, which is also what happened with the JASON Group. [IMG]file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/maggie/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/moz-screenshot-5.png[/IMG]

(See attachment 1 below)

Three different JASON studies: 1967, 1978, and 1988. JASON started out at IDA. SRI became independent of Stanford University in 1970 and at this moment JASON might have moved over there until about 1978-1979 when its headquarters were relocated again, this time to the MITRE Corporation. A leaked 1973 membership list of the JASON Group, which is accurate, shows JASON had already been incorporated within SRI in 1973.

The above compilation of three different JASON studies shows how the organization it was part of changed over time (4). In the late 1960s it was incorporated within IDA; in the late 1970s it had been moved to Stanford Research Institute International (SRI); and in the late 1980s the JASONs had become part of the MITRE Corporation. Most studies were commissioned by DARPA, but other contractors have been the Department of Energy, the Department of Defense, the U.S. Army Research Office, the NRO, and a few other organizations.

James Killian was the most central player in the creation of all these civilian research institutions under Eisenhower. He not only founded IDA in 1957, but also the President's Science Advisory Committee (PSAC), both of which he became chairman. In 1958, he founded ARPA and as head of IDA, he approved the proposal to create the JASON Group. In 1958, Killian was also asked to create the Communications Research Division (CRD) within IDA, a Princeton-located top secret think tank for the NSA. Then, in 1959, Killian oversaw the creation of MITRE. He became a trustee of MITRE in 1960 and from 1967 to 1969 he was chairman of the board of trustees of this think tank, which was very similar to IDA and RAND. He remained on the board until 1982. In 1960, together with the earlier-mentioned William O. Baker and JASON scholars Richard Garwin and Sidney Drell, Killian was a co-founder of the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), an intelligence agency that remained secret for about a decade; although its existence was only announced officially after the Cold War had ended (5). Back in 1957, Vannevar Bush is said to have suggested Killian as the follow-up of defense secretary Charles E. Wilson. That didn't go through as Neil McElroy became Eisenhower's new secretary of defense.

(See attachment 2 below)
Vannevar Bush was chairman of MIT from 1957 to 1959 and would be followed up by Killian. Both had long careers at MIT. Killian was involved in founding PSAC, DARPA, MITRE, NRO, IDA, JASON, CRD, and possibly IDA's Research and Engineering Support Division and its Economic and Political Studies Division. JASON, as a part time group, would do studies for many of these organizations.

Most JASON studies have to do with the development of new cutting edge technology concepts for the electronic battlefield. The contractors evaluate the papers written by JASON members and then decide whether or not to do something with it. Many other studies have to do with the nuclear weapons arsenal. In the early 1990s, a couple of studies were done on climate change; in the mid 1990s studies started into the human genome; and still a couple of years later this science was combined with nanotechnology. Almost all studies are conducted to see if these technologies can be used to maintain a military advantage over the enemy. Recent studies have also involved the concept of Homeland Security. A good example of this is the 2002-2003 study 'Biodetection Architectures'. Since a lot of JASONs are university professors, most studies are conducted in the summer months when students are on leave. It is believed that each year about 15 studies are conducted, half of them classified. A study can be done by as little as two or three JASON members to as many as 17 or 18.

In the JASON membership list you will find 11 Nobel prize winners, usually received for achievements in physics (6). The vast majority of JASONs have Ph.D.'s in this field although some have chosen to specialize in electrical engineering, mathematics, oceanography, chemistry, or biological sciences. Generally, JASONs, especially the older ones, are very well rounded and can be involved in a wide variety of studies spanning multiple decades. One of its founders, Sidney Drell, was still active in 2003. Freeman Dyson is another member whose career with the JASONs spans four decades. Some other long time members are Stanley Flatte, Richard Garwin, Curtis Callan, and Alvin Despain. These were active since the 1970s or the early eighties and were still performing studies at the beginning of the 21th century. According to different sources, JASON consisted of about 45 to 50 members at any given time. Counting the members manually per decade in the membership list confirms that and seems to indicate the list is almost complete. Information about the 1960s remains scarce though, but the group started out with about 15 members and rapidly expanded.

The universities below are represented by the 119 JASON members that can be found in the membership list. The list below refers to the universities these individual JASON University Percentage California 50% Princeton, Princeton (NJ) 14% Stanford, Silicon Valley (CA) 13% Harvard, Boston 8% MIT, Boston 8% Columbia, New York 7% Chicago 5% Cornell, Ithaca (NY) 4% Texas 4% Maryland 4% Michigan 4% Washington 3% Rockefeller, New York 2% Yale, New Haven 1% Dartmouth, Hanover (NH) 1% members have been employed, not where they got their education.

Los Alamos, Lawrence Livermore, Caltech, the Scripps Institution for Oceanography, and a bunch of faculties in the Los Angeles area are all managed by the University of California. This is one reason for the large amount JASONs affiliated with this university. A second reason is that Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore are the most important labs in the United States for research in nuclear energy and nuclear weapons, which has always been a primary occupation of JASON members. The South-West is also the location where most of the weapons systems and other cutting edge technology is developed. Stanford, although many times smaller than the UC complex, is another university really focused on science and technology. It is located right in the middle of Silicon Valley and quite a few JASON members have been employed at its Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC); and more often than not, they held the senior positions. Another significant portion of JASON members have been employed at Princeton and some of its most veteran members worked at the physics lab of this university: Curtis Callan, Freeman Dyson, and Francis Perkins. They were all active for JASON from the sixties or the early seventies until the turn of the century. Another prominent physicist at Princeton was John Wheeler.

Most JASONs never played any significant role in politics. There are a few exceptions of course and these exceptions tend to be members of the Council on Foreign Relations. Of the 119 individuals in the membership list, only 11 are members of the CFR. These 11 are the ones who usually chair all kinds of national science committees, advise presidents on scientific matters, and work for a variety of large corporations. Non-CFR JASONs often have impressive biographies too, but they tend to focus on other things than Washington politics or Wall Street business.

Even though there are not a whole lot, below you can find a short list of some of the more interesting individuals in the JASON Group. Take a look at the membership list for additional details.

Name JASON Description

Luis W. Alvarez
60's-70's Developed the detonators for 'Fat Man' during the Manhattan Project. On board the Enola Gay as it dropped the bomb. Pushed for the development of thermo-nuclear weapons. Together with J. Allen Hynek he was a member of the January 1953 Durant Panel Report in which the recent UFO waves were debunked as paranoia and considered no threat to national security. According to the panel the phenomenon should be ignored because the "irrelevant reports" were "clogging the channels of communication". According to Hynek the Pentagon wouldn't allow any other position on the subject. Joined the board board of IDA and stayed until 1967. In 1965, Alvarez X-rayed the great pyramid of Khafre (Giza) in search for hidden chambers. Initially the team reported all kinds of anomalous behavior which made their data unreadable, but quickly thereafter they reported that there weren't any problems. Analyzed the Zapruder film in 1967, which convinced the Church Committee in 1976 that Kennedy's headshot could have been caused by a bullet from behind, indicating Oswald was the sole assassin. Received the Nobel Prize in 1968. In 1980, together with his son, Alvarez published the theory that an asteroid wiped out the dinosaurs 65 million years ago.

Lewis M. Branscomb
1960's Recipient of the Vannevar Bush Award of the National Science Board and the Rockefeller Public Service Award in 1957. Vice president and chief scientist of IBM Corporation. Director at IBM. President's Science Advisory Committee (PSAC) 1964–1968. Has been a director of Mobil Corp., RAND, MITRE, Lord Corp., C.S. Draper Laboratories and Arcturus Pharmaceutical. Member of the American Ditchley Foundation. Prominent in the War on Terror movement since 9/11.

Sidney D. Drell

60's - 21th

Member of the CFR and the President's Science Advisory Committee (PASC). Co founder of the NRO and the JASON Group. Worked with the CIA. Member National Security Council. Very influential individual, especially in things pertaining to the nuclear weapons arsenal.

Richard L. Garwin

60's - 21th

Co founder of the NRO. Director of Science and Technology of the CFR. Served on the President's Science Advisory Committee (PSAC) and chaired its panels on Military Aircraft, Anti-submarine and Naval Warfare. Informed Henry Kissinger on certain science topics. Expert in electromagnetic weaponry, but admitted he didn't have access to all the of the compartmented programs that are going on.

Murray Gell-Mann
60's - 80's Received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1969 for his work in creating the 'standard model' in physics. Concerned with global policy matters such as population growth, conservation and biodiversity, sustainable economic development, and geopolitical stability. Co-chairman of the Science Board of the Santa Fe Institute. Member of the CFR and the Royal Society of London. Trustee of the World Conservation Society together with the Astors, Rockefellers, Phipps, Schiffs and other elite Pilgrims Society families. In February 2006, Gell-Mann attended The Amazing Meeting in Las Vegas, a benefit for the James Randi Educational Foundation. Phil Plait (the "bad astronomer" and nemesis of Richard Hoagland) also spoke at the conference.

Joshua Lederberg

1980's

Member of the CFR. Throughout his career a science advisor to the government and employed by the Rockefellers. President of the Rockefeller University 1978-1990. Chairman of Jimmy Carter's President's Cancer Panel in 1979. In 1994, he headed the Defense Science Board Task Force on Persian Gulf War Health Effects, which investigated Gulf War Syndrome. It concluded that there was no evidence of a "specific Gulf War Syndrome" and no evidence of biochemical exposures.

Gordon J.F. MacDonald

70's - 90's

Member of the CFR. Consultant to NASA. President's Science Advisory Committee (PSAC). Expert in weather control technology who predicted it would be able to cause droughts or severe rain by the year 2018. In the 1970s, according to Nexus Magazine, Zbigniew Brzezinski wrote: "Political strategists are tempted to exploit research on the brain and human behavior. Geophysicist Gordon J. F. MacDonald-specialist in problems of warfare-says accurately-timed, artificially-excited electronic strokes 'could lead to a pattern of oscillations that produce relatively high power levels over certain regions of the Earth... In this way, one could develop a system that would seriously impair the brain performance of very large populations in selected regions over an extended period..."

William A. Nierenberg
70's - 90's Member of the CFR. Director of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography from 1965 to 1986. Member of the Board of Science Advisors at Science and Environmental Policy Project (SEPP). Science advisor to NATO and the U.S. State Department. Served on the advisory board of the Electric Power Research Institute. Chairman of the first National Academy of Sciences study (1983-1984) on the greenhouse effect, possible sea-level rises, and climate change, which was conducted in the early part of the eighties (titled: 'Changing Climate' and 'Acid Rain'). Frequent visitor of New York and well known at the Rockefeller University. He was a protege of Detlev Bronk, president of the Rockefeller University.

Back in early 1970s there was a group called Scientists and Engineers for Social and Political Action (SESPA). They criticized the JASONs for their support of the Vietnam war. Some myths were helped in the world by this group, mainly that the JASONs were an "elite group" with "extremely high levels" of clearance. They indicated that JASONs had above top secret clearances by adding that "Top Secret is a low level of clearance" (7).

JASON scholar Richard Garwin, director of Science and Technology at the CFR, basically summarizes the story of JASON in the following statement:

"In my analyses of the effect of radiowaves on people [for the DoD], I have never found any significant effect other than heating of the tissues... So I don't think there is much in the threat of electromagnetic signals to control or disorient people by the effect on the human brain... [but] there are always 'compartments' to which even people with high-level security clearances do not have access." (8)

Most JASONs do not have any significant background in the military, in intelligence or as engineers and directors in private defense-oriented corporations as TRW, Lockheed, Northop, E-Systems, Bechtel or SAIC. Quite a bit of evidence has surfaced to indicate this is where all the real action has been going on, at least since the 1950s and 1960s. In case of electromagnetics, someone like Col. John Alexander would be much better suited to be put in charge of these black projects. Not only his high level background in Military Intelligence would qualify him for that, but also his controversial history and associates at, for example, the US Global Security Council, a private institution filled with generals, admirals, directors of every intelligence agency, SAIC executives, politicians, hawkish neoconservatives, Opus Dei members, Knights of Malta and supporters of the Unification Church. Edward Teller, a friend of Col. Alexander, used to be a member of that think tank (9).

(See attachment 3 below)
The career of JASON scholar Luis W. Alvarez, one of the more interesting early members. Update, Dec. 2008: Alvarez was also part of a Los Alamos committee in 1979 which in all likelyhood covered up Israeli nuclear bomb tests in the Indian Ocean by claiming the detected flashes could have been due to "unusual weather conditions". (2006, Michael Karpin, 'The Bomb in the Basement'). It is known that one of Alvarez's colleagues, the rabid anti-communist hardliner and father of the hydrogen bomb, Edward Teller, was close to the Israeli leadership and advised this country on nuclear matters. It is also known that Israel received enormous support from elements in French and U.S. intelligence in setting up a secret nuclear weapon program.

A small portion of the JASONs might have been privy to the nation's biggest secrets back in the 1950s and maybe 1960s, but there's no indication of that in the past few decades. They are a group of university professors doing defense-oriented research for the DoD on a part-time basis. Their papers indicate they are working on what is generally considered the cutting edge of science; but these are still the kind of things you can read about in every popular science magazine. It's a far cry from technology descriptions that have come from the deep black programs located in the military-industrial complex. The problem of course of that last category is that you can never be completely sure where misinformation and disinformation ends and reliable statements begin. In any case, the academic-civilian structure from which JASON emerged remains interesting as this was established during the exact time when president Eisenhower is said to have lost control over the blackest programs within the US government. As the story goes, his intention was that the civilian-government structure, represented by such institutions as IDA and MITRE, were at all times aware of the nation's deepest secrets. Something seems to have gone wrong with that idea (10), hence Eisenhower's last speech to the nation in January 1961 in which he warned for the rise of the military-industrial complex. An excerpt of that speech can be read in the column on the left.

References

[1] February 10, 1986, American Institute of Physics, Interview with Kenneth M. Watson (Drell is mentioned as a co-founder in some of his biographies)
[2] 2005, Institute for Defense Analyses, IDA's History
[3] Ibid.
[4] Federation of American Scientists (FAS), 'JASON Defense Advisory Panel Reports'
[5] August 18, 2000, NRO news, 'NRO Honors Pioneers of National Reconnaissance'
[6] Storming Media, 'MITRE CORP MCLEAN VA JASON PROGRAM OFFICE'
If you click on the link to Storming Media you will find a list of JASON studies. In each individual description you can find several of the authors. When you compare all these names with other sources you'll find the same names. It turned out to be so easy it's almost embarrasing.
[7] December 1972, Scientists and Engineers for Social and Political Action (SESPA), 'Science Against the People - The Story of Jason'
[8] Email conversation between Mind Justice and Richard Garwin
[9] More information and sources in PEHI's article on Le Cercle
[10] Disclosure Project testimony of Master Sergeant Dan Morris, USAF (Retired)/ NRO Operative:
"Now, Eisenhower wanted somebody to be in charge, he tried the CIA Director, and it didn’t work. The CIA was working primarily for itself. Most of the intelligence directors of the services were working for themselves. So he said, “I want it to be independent, I want it to be civilian. I want it to be some of our top scientists.” So it was organized but the name of the NRO was kept secret for years."
Disclosure Project testimony of Brigadier General Steven Lovekin, who was part of Eisenhower's and Kennedy's staff:
"I served under Eisenhower from May of 1959 until he got out of office and then I served under Kennedy until I left the service in August of 1961... Bluebook was discussed quite openly in the office... One afternoon when we were just about ready to finish up training, Colonel Holomon brought out a piece of what appeared to be metallic debris... He went on to further explain that this was the material that had come from a New Mexico crash in 1947 of an extraterrestrial craft... When he would get these [UFO] reports it would excite him [Eisenhower]. He was just a kid. He would get so excited and give orders like D-day was happening all over again. He was very, very interested in the shapes and sizes of the UFOs and what made them go... But what happened was that Eisenhower got sold out. Without him knowing it he lost control of what was going on with the entire UFO situation... I think he felt like he trusted too many people. And Eisenhower was a trusting man. He was a good man. And I think that he realized that all of a sudden this matter is going into the control of corporations that could very well act to the detriment of this country. This frustration, from what I can remember, went on for months. He realized that he was losing control of the UFO subject. He realized that the phenomenon or whatever it was that we were faced with was not going to be in the best hands. As far as I can remember, that was the expression that was used, “It is not going to be in the best hands”."

Additional references

[1] March 1967, Jason Division of IDA, 'Tactical Nuclear Weapons in Southeast Asia'
[2] March 3, 1968, New York Times, Sane Bids the U.S. Uphold Atom Ban'
[3] April 29, 1972, New York Times, 'Lab Occupation Ends'
[4] June 6, 1985, Washington Post, 'CIA Studies Sub Vulnerability'
[5] November 12, 1985, LA Times, 'Scientists Dispute Test of X-Ray Laser Weapon Livermore Lab...'
[6] June 4, 1986, LA Times, 'X-Ray Laser Test Data Inaccurate, GAO Study Finds'
[7] June 20, 1986, LA Times, 'Defense Expert Physicist Expected to Be Named as Scripps Director'
[8] February 18, 1990, Washington Post, 'Board Responded to a Narrow Question'
[9] November 1994, JASON & The MITRE Corporation report, 'Science Based Stockpile Stewardship' (JSR-94-345)
[10] August 4, 1995, JASON & The MITRE Corporation report about Nuclear Testing (JSR-95-320)
[11] August 15, 1995, Washington Post, 'Relevancy, at Last' [12] October 1, 1995, Washington Times, 'Should we sign on to a nuclear test ban treaty?'
[13] October 28, 1995, San Francisco Chronicle, 'Bechtel Lands Nuclear Test Job'
[14] November 26, 1997, Washington Times, 'Ratifying the nuclear test ban treaty is a step toward nonproliferation'
[15] September 27, 1999, United Press International, 'US Not Ready for Bio-War Attack'
[16] December 17, 1999, LA Times, 'Adrift at a Tender Age'
[17] September 18, 2001, San Francisco, Chronicle, 'Bacteria, viruses pose grave threat, experts say'
[18] March 9, 2003, San Francisco Chronicle, 'Battlefield nukes Secret Vietnam-era report, just declassified, highlighted dangers'
[19] March 9, 2003, LA Times, 'MILITARY STRATEGY; Making the Case Against Calamity'
[20] March 9, 2003, LA Times, 'NUCLEAR WEAPONS; A Bad Idea in Vietnam, an Even Worse Idea Today'
[21] March 9, 2003, Washington Post, ''67 Study Discouraged Use of Nuclear Weapons in Vietnam War'
[22] December 15, 2004, United Press International, 'Report: Govt secrecy hurting warfighters'
[23] December 19, 2004, United Press International, 'Group slams unwieldy security'
[24] May 26, 2005, FAS, 'JASON on Sensors to Support the Soldier'
[25] Wikipedia, 'JASON Defense Advisory Group'

[Magda Hassan]

Abarbanel, Henry D.I.
University of California; Scripps Institution of Oceanography; Institute for Nonlinear Science
80's - 21th
Professor of Physics. Some of the things his lab does research on are Erbium doped fiber ring lasers and information processing in biological neural assemblies.

Alivisatos, Paul
University of California
21th
Chemist. Specialist in nanotechnology.

Alvarez, Luis W.
University of California; Los Alamos; M.I.T.; MITRE; University of Chicago; Institut D'Egypte; IBM; Hewlett-Packard; PSAC
60's-70's
Developed the detonators for 'Fat Man' during the Manhattan Project. On board the Enola Gay as it dropped the bomb. Pushed for the development of thermo-nuclear weapons. Together with J. Allen Hynek he was a member of the January 1953 Durant Panel Report in which the recent UFO waves were debunked as paranoia and considered no threat to national security. According to the panel the phenomenon should be ignored because the "irrelevant reports" were "clogging the channels of communication". According to Hynek the Pentagon wouldn't allow any other position on the subject. Joined the board of trustees of MITRE, founded in 1959, and left in 1967. In 1965, Alvarez X-rayed the great pyramid of Khafre (Giza) in search for hidden chambers. Initially the team reported all kinds of anomalous behavior which made their data unreadable, but quickly thereafter they reported that there weren't any problems and that nothing was found. Received the Nobel Prize in 1968. Held a lakeside talk at the Bohemian Grove in 1969.Analyzed the Zapruder film in 1967, which convinced the Church Committee in 1976 that Kennedy's headshot could have been caused by a bullet from behind, indicating Oswald was the sole assassin. Alvarez was also part of a Los Alamos committee in 1979 which in all likelyhood covered up Israeli nuclear bomb tests in the Indian Ocean by claiming the detected flashes could have been due to "unusual weather conditions". (2006, Michael Karpin, 'The Bomb in the Basement'). It is known that one of Alvarez's colleagues, the rabid anti-communist hardliner and father of the hydrogen bomb, Edward Teller, was close to the Israeli leadership and advised this country on nuclear matters. It is also known that Israel received enormous support from elements in French and U.S. intelligence in setting up a secret nuclear weapon program. In 1980, together with his son, Alvarez developed the theory that an asteroid wiped out the dinosaurs 65 million years ago.

Amarel, Saul
Columbia University; DARPA
70's-80's
Saul Amarel was born in Salonika, Greece, and moved with his family to what became Israel, where he fought in Israel's war of independence. He then went to Columbia University and later helped develop the field of artificial intelligence. He ran the National Institutes of Health's first project on use of computers in such diverse fields as biomedicine, engineering design and ecology. Amarel served as director of the Information Sciences and Technology Office of the DARPA from 1985 to 1988. He founded the computer science department at Rutgers University.

Banks, Peter M.
University of Michigan; Stanford University; NASA
80's - 90's
Professor of Physics and Engineering. Principal Investigator for NASA on many scientific projects, including three Space Shuttle experiments in the last decade. In the mid-1980s he headed an international group of scientists who assisted NASA with science planning and accommodations for the International Space Station.

Berman, Samuel M.
University of California; Stanford University;
70's - 80's
Professor of Physics and an expert in the effects of light. Worked on the concept that major increases in light source efficiency are achievable.

Bildsten, Lars
University of California; Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics; American Physical Society
21th
Assistant and associate professor in both the Physics and Astronomy departments at University of California, Berkeley from January 1995 through July 1999. During the most recent Decadal Survey of Astronomy and Astrophysics , Bildsten served on two NRC Panels: High Energy Astrophysics from Space and Theory, Computation and Data Exploration. He was an elected member of the Executive Committee of the High Energy Astrophysics Division of the American Astronomical Society in 2000 and 2001 and served on the NRC's Committee on Astronomy and Astrophysics from 2001 to 2005. He was recently elected to serve on the Executive Committee of the Division of Astrophysics of the American Physical Society. Today a professor at the Department of Physics of the Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics.

Block, Steven M.
Stanford University
90's - 21th
Professor of biological sciences and of applied physics. Studies the effect of bio-weapons.

Branscomb, Lewis M.
Harvard; University of Colorado; University of California; Scripps Institution for Oceanography; BCSIA; IBM; National Science Board; Carnegie; RAND; MITRE; NGC; PSAC; CFR; American Ditchley Foundation
1960's
Professor of physics. Branscomb pioneered the study of atomic and molecular negative ions and their role in the atmospheres of the earth and stars and was a co-founder of the Joint Institute for Laboratory Astrophysics (JILA) at the University of Colorado. While there, he was Editor of the Reviews of Modern Physics. After serving as director of the U.S. National Bureau of Standards (now the Institute for Standards and Technology) from 1969–1972, he was named vice president and chief scientist of IBM Corporation and a member of the IBM Corporate Management Board. In 1980, President Jimmy Carter appointed him to the National Science Board and in 1980, he was elected chairman, serving until May 1984. Branscomb was appointed by President Lyndon Johnson to the President's Science Advisory Committee (1964–1968) and by President Ronald Reagan to the National Productivity Advisory Committee. He served twice as a director of the AAAS, member of the NAS Council and of the Governing Board of the National Research Council. He is a former president of the American Physical Society and a former president of Sigma Xi. He is a recipient of the Vannevar Bush Award of the National Science Board and the Rockefeller Public Service Award in 1957. Branscomb has written extensively on information technology, comparative science and technology policy, management of innovation and technology, and science for countering terrorism. He was the co-chair, with Richard Klausner, of the Academies' study entitled 'Making the Nation Safer: The Role of Science and Technology in Countering Terrorism', released on June 25, 2002. Director (emeritus) of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. Research Associate at the Scripps Institution for Oceanography and the University of California, San Diego. Director of Mobil Corp.(1978-1999), RAND Corp. (1972-1982), MITRE (1987-1999), Lord Corp. (since 1987), C.S. Draper Laboratories (since 1988), and Arcturus Pharmaceutical Corp. (1992-1993). Member, JASON Division, Institute for Defense Analyses from 1962 to 1969. Member of the Committee on Japan Affairs of the National Academy of Sciences since 1989. Member of the Advisory Board of the Rand Corporation's Critical Technologies Institute since 1992. Trustee of the Carnegie Institution of Washington (1973-1989), Vanderbilt University (since 1980), National Geographic Society (since 1984), Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (since 1985), and the Commonwealth Fund (1974-1980). Anno 2005, he is a member of the Advisory Council of the American Ditchley Foundation.

Brenner, Michael
Unknown.
21th
One Brenner is a young mathematician from Harvard, the other is an older molecular biologist from the University of Alabama. As a JASON this person worked on projects like the nuclear deterrent, biotech, nanotech, and medical imaging technology. He also worked on a project to see how sonar could be modified so it won't cause problems for whales.

Briggs, R.
Unknown
1990's
This name is mentioned in the 1992 JASON study 'Accelerator Production of Tritium (APT)'.

Brodsky, R.
Unknown
1990's
This name is mentioned in the 1992 JASON study 'Accelerator Production of Tritium (APT)'.

Caldwell, David O.
University of California
60's - 70's
Professor of physics. Director University of California Institute for Nuclear and Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology (INPAC), which oversees 8 UC campuses, Lawrence Livermore, and Los Alamos.

Callan, Curtis G., Jr.
Princeton University
70's - 21th
Professor of physics. Chairman of Princeton's Department of Physics.

Case, Kenneth M.
Rockefeller University
70's - 21th
Professor of physics. Relatively unknown, but worked with many of the greats. Played an important role after WWII in the development of nuclear energy.

Chamberlain, Joseph W.
University of Chicago Yerkes Observatory; Adler Planetarium; NASA's Lunar Science Institute
60's - 70's
Professor of physics and astronomy Stepped down as head of the Adler Planetarium in 1991. He was quite an important NASA employee back in the early 1960's.

Chervin, Robert
National Center for Atmospheric Research
1990's
Climate and Global Dynamics Division of the National Center for Atmospheric Research. Did a lot of research on the world's ocean currents. Involved in the 1992 JASON study 'CHAMMP' (now Climate Change Prediction Program).

Christ, Norman H.
Columbia University
60's - 70's
Professor of physics. Chairman of Columbia's physics department.

Collela, Phil
University of California
1990's
Computer scientist at the University of California Berkeley Lab. As a JASON he worked on a project on how to move climate models from the then (1992) current generation of supercomputers to the massively parallel computers of today. Phil was the co-creator of 'Titanium', a JAVA dialect which made it possible to produce highly detailed simulations of fluid dynamics in biological systems.

Cornwall, John M.
University of California; Los Alamos; Defense Threat Reduction Agency; National Security Advisory Committee of Lawrence Livermore
80's - 21th
Professor of Physics at the UCLA and Los Alamos.

Dally, William J. Stanford;
M.I.T.
90's - 21th
Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. He and his group have developed the system architecture, network architecture, signaling, routing, and synchronization technology that can be found in most large parallel computers today. Chairman of the Computer Science Department at Stanford University where he leads projects on high-speed signaling, multiprocessor architecture, and graphics architecture.

Dashen, Roger F.
Caltech; Institute for Advanced Study; University of California; U.S. Navy
60's - 70's
Professor of physics. Chairman of the UCSD Department of Physics from 1988 to 1994. Dashen was one of the most influential particle theorists of his generation and played a leading role in the development of our modern understanding of symmetries in quantum field theory. Dashen served the U.S. Navy as a high level advisor in many capacities and was for several years the chair of the Navy's top level committee on the security of SSBNs (missile carrying submarines) and other aspects of anti-submarine warfare.

Davis, Russ E.
University of California; Scripps Institution of Oceanography; Consortium on the Ocean's Role in Climate - Abrupt Climate Change Studies
1980's
Professor of Chemical Engineering.

Despain, Alvin M.
University of California; Acorn Technologies
80's - 21th
Professor of computer engineering. Professor in the Computer Science and Electrical Engineering Systems Departments and a staff member of Information Sciences Institute of USC. Despain is a pioneer in the study of high performance computer systems. His research group builds experimental software and hardware systems including compilers, simulators, design tools, custom VLSI processors, and multiprocessor systems.

Diamond, Patrick H.
University of California
90's - 21th
Professor of Physics. Heads the Plasma Theory group at the University of California together with JASON professor Marshall N. Rosenbluth.

Dietz, R.J.
Unknown
1990's
He is mentioned in the 1992 JASON study 'Accelerator Production of Tritium (APT)'.

Dimotakis, Paul E.
Caltech
90's - 21th
Professor of Aeronautics and Professor of Applied Physics at Caltech. He and his group have introduced advances in signal processing, high-speed digital temporal- and image-data acquisition techniques, high-speed CCD imager design, and image-data processing. He has participated in the development of pilotless drones, high-power chemical lasers, the stealth fighter, and contributed to the development of the Space Shuttle aerodynamics.

Drell, Sidney D.
Stanford; University of California; NRO; CIA; National Security Council; CFR; President's Science Advisory Committee
60's - 21th
Professor of physics. Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institute. Drell has been widely recognized for his contributions in the study of theoretical physics, particularly elementary particle processes and quantum theory. Served as a key scientific consultant to the CIA's satellite reconnaissance program and was instrumental in securing congressional approval for several NRO (existence acknowledged only in 1992 by the DoD) special projects. Co-founder of JASON. chairman of the Panel on Nuclear Weapons Safety of the House Armed Services Committee, the Technology Review Panel of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, and the U.C. President's Council that oversees Los Alamos, Lawrence Berkeley, and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories. He helped establish Stanford's Center for International Security and Arms Control and was its codirector, 1983-1989. He was president of the American Physical Society in 1986 and chaired the Department of Energy's High Energy Physics Panel for nine years. From 1993 to 2001, Drell served as a member of the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board. From 1993 to 2001, Drell served as a member of the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board. He has also been a member of the Commission on Maintaining U.S. Nuclear Weapons Expertise and the President's Science Advisory Committee and has consulted for the National Security Council, the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, and the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment.

Dyson, Freeman J. Cornell;
Princeton University
60's - 21th
Born in England and worked as a civilian scientist for the Royal Air Force in World War 2. Professor of physics. Cornell University made him a professor without bothering about his lack of Ph.D. He subsequently worked on nuclear reactors, solid state physics, ferromagnetism, astrophysics and biology. From 1957 to 1961 he worked on the Orion Project, which proposed the possibility of space-flight using nuclear propulsion: a prototype was demonstrated using conventional explosives, but a treaty banning the use of nuclear weapons in space caused the project to be abandoned. The Dyson sphere theory is named after him. Together with Sidney Drell the longest sitting JASON scholar.

Eardley, Douglas M.
University of California
80's - 21th
Professor of Physics at UCSB Institute for Theoretical Physics .

Fisher, Frederick H.
University of California; Scripps Institution of Oceanography
21th
Professor of physics. Died in 2005. Fisher began his career at Scripps Institution of Oceanography's Marine Physical Laboratory (MPL) in 1955, conducting Ph.D. thesis research. Worked his whole life at the institute and became a leader in ocean sound propagation research. At Scripps, Fisher served as vice chairman of the Scripps Staff Council. Member of the Governing Board of the American Institute of Physics from 1985-1991.

Fitch, Val L.
Princeton University
60's - 70's
Professor of physics. As a soldier he was sent to Los Alamos to work on the Manhattan Project. Awarded the 1980 Nobel Prize in Physics for a 1964 experiment that proved that certain subatomic reactions do not adhere to fundamental symmetry principles. Chairman of the Physics Department. at Princeton.

Flatte, Stanley M.
University of California
70's - 21th
Professor of physics and oceanographer at UCSD.

Foley, Henry M.
Columbia University
60's - 70's
Professor of physics at Columbia University. Has been chairman of the physics department. Member of the advisory panel of International Security and Commerce - MX missile basing. Deceased.

Fortson, E. Norval
University of Washington
80's - 21th
Professor of Physics. E. Norval Fortson is currently a professor in the Department of Physics at University of Washington. He is an expert in laser-optical techniques for atomic physics and uses laser-optical techniques to tackle issues in experimental atomic physics. Fortson is best known for his leadership in high-precision tests of such fundamental physical laws as time-reversal invariance, local Lorentz invariance and the electroweak theory. His group has repeatedly advanced the precision attainable in such measurements, producing exacting tests of theoretical ideas.

Freedman, Michael H.
University of California; Princeton University; Microsoft
80's - 90's
Professor in the Department of Mathematics at the University of California at San Diego. Freedman was awarded a Fields Medal in 1986 for his work on the Poincaré conjecture, a famous 20th century math problem he solved. It seems that this achievement made him a member of the JASON Group. Theory Group at Microsoft Research.

Frieman, Edward A.
Princeton University
60's - 80's
As a diver he participated in the atomic bomb tests at Bikini Atoll. He received his Ph.D. in physics in 1951. Worked at Princeton on a classified nuclear weapons program. Met with Albert Einstein, Robert Oppenheimer, and Edward Teller. Frieman served as associate director of Princeton's Plasma Physics Laboratory 1964-1979. While at Princeton, Frieman met Admiral Bobby Ray Inman (who introduced him to the world of submarines, military strategy, and naval tactics).

Garwin, Richard L.
Columbia University; PSAC; IBM; Arms Control and Non-proliferation Advisory Board, Department of State; NRO; CFR; President's Science Advisory Committee
60's - 21th
Professor of physics at Columbia University. Member of the IBM Research Division. Chairman of the Arms Control and Nonproliferation Advisory Board of the Department of State from 1994 to 2001. He is the Director in Science and Technology of the Council on Foreign Relations. Garwin served on the President's Science Advisory Committee, and chaired its panels on Military Aircraft, Anti-submarine and Naval Warfare. He established standards and found solutions for electromechanical design of modern spacecraft. As a champion of Electro-Optical Imaging, he helped Henry Kissinger understand its role for the national defense of the United States. Mindjustice.org: "Garwin kindly replied to email questions in January, 2005 and said he has evaluated electromagnetic weapons for the Defense Department several times but “there are always ‘compartments’ to which even people with high-level security clearances do not have access.” Garwin concluded, “...In my analyses of the effect of radiowaves on people, I have never found any significant effect other than heating of the tissues. ...So I don't think there is much in the threat of electromagnetic signals to control or disorient people by the effect on the human brain." According to the CFR "Garwin is an internationally renowned physicist with expertise in intelligence and on nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and defenses." During the 1968 Tet-offensive Garwin, Kendall, and two other Pentagon scientists were sent to Vietnam to see how new technology might turn the tables again, especially in Khe Sanh. It is likely they had to give their opinion on the use of tactical nuclear weapons, since rumors had surfaced that the U.S. was preparing to use them.

Gell-Mann, Murray
Institute for Advanced Study; University of Chicago; University of California; Santa Fe Institute; CFR; WCS; Royal Society
60's - 80's
Professor of physics. In 1952 Gell-Mann joined the Institute for Nuclear Studies at the University of Chicago before he went to Caltech. The most well known part of Gell-Mann's work was his theory of 'quarks', the fundamental particles that make up the protons and neutrons of ordinary matter. Gell-Mann and others further developed his ideas to build the powerful 'standard model' of particle physics, which to this day reigns as our best theory of the nature of matter. Received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1969 for his work pertaining to the classification of subatomic particles and their interactions. In June 1972 Gell-Man was chased out of the College de France by a group of young French scientists who were outraged at his contributions to the Vietnam War. When he was questioned by the audiece about his work for JASON his response was, "I am not free to answer." Co-Chairman of the Science Board of the Santa Fe Institute. Member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Gell-Mann is concerned with global policy matters such as population growth, conservation and biodiversity, sustainable economic development, and geopolitical stability. Member of the Royal Society of London. Trustee of the World Conservation Society together with the Astors, Rockefellers, Phipps, Schiffs, and other elite families. In February 2006, Gell-Mann attended The Amazing Meeting in Las Vegas, a benefit for the James Randi Educational Foundation. Phil Plait (the "bad astronomer" and nemesis of Richard Hoagland) also spoke at the conference.

Gifford, David K.
M.I.T.; Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory
21th
Professor of Computer Science and Engineering at MIT. Head of the Computational Genomics Group at the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL).

Glaser, Donald A.
University of Michigan; University of California; Lawrence Radiation Laboratory; Brookhaven National Laboratory in NY
60's - 70's
Professor of physics and mathematics. Worked on particle and nuclear physics in different labs. Awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1960.

Goldberger, Marvin L.
University of California; Caltech; CFR
60's - 80's
Professor of Physics. In 1959 Goldberger, along with Sam Treiman (JASON scientist) established the Goldberger-Treiman relations, which gave a quantitative connection between the strong and weak interaction properties of the proton and neutron. From 1978-1987 he served as the president of CalTech where he stressed undergraduate education, and oversaw the revision of teaching standards, restructuring of curriculum, and the renovation of the undergraduate dorms. Goldberger was the cochairman of the National Research Council and a member of the Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation International Advisory Board. He has authored works such as 'Collision Theory' and was the editor of Research-Doctorate Programs in the United States: 'Continuity and Change' and 'Verification: Monitoring Disarmament' (Pugwash Monograph). Trustee (emeritus) of the Aspen Institute.

Gomer, Robert
University of Chicago; James Franck Institute; PSAC; Directorate of Physical Sciences; Air Force Office of Scientific Research; Universities Space Research Association
60's - 70's
Professor of chemistry at the University of Chicago. He served on numerous scientific committees, including the President's Science Advisory Committee (1961-1965) and the Advisory Committee for the Directorate of Physical Sciences, Air Force Office of Scientific Research (1961-1975), and was a member of the Board of Directors of the Universities Space Research Association (1976-1978). From 1977 to 1983 he served as director of the James Franck Institute.

Goodman, Jeremy
Princeton University
90's - 21th
Professor of Astrophysical Sciences at Princeton. His research interests Astrophysical Hydrodynamics, Stellar Dynamics, Interstellar Scintillation, and Gamma-Ray Bursts.

Goodman, Jeremy
Princeton University
90's - 21th
Professor of Astrophysical Sciences at Princeton. His research interests Astrophysical Hydrodynamics, Stellar Dynamics, Interstellar Scintillation, and Gamma-Ray Bursts.

Gregg, Michael C.
University of Washington
80's - 21th
Professor of Oceanography. His longterm objectives are to understand how the ocean mixes and to develop parameterizations of mixing rates that can be used in numerical models that cannot resolve mixing processes.

Grober, Robert
University of Maryland
21th
Professor of Physics. His 'Grober Lab' has a main focus on characterization of semiconductor nanostructures, characterization of photoacids in chemically amplified photoresist, and fluorescence imaging in biomedical engineering.

Hammer, David A.
Cornell; University of California; Naval Research Laboratory; University of Maryland; American Physical Society
80's - 21th
J. Carlton Ward Professor of Nuclear Energy Engineering and Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering. He has been on the Cornell faculty since 1977. Hammer worked at the Naval Research Laboratory in 1969-1976, was a Visiting Associate Professor (part time) at the University of Maryland in 1973-1976, and was an Associate Professor at UCLA in 1977; in 1983-84 and 1991, he was a Visiting Senior Fellow at Imperial College, London. He has been a consultant to several corporations and government laboratories. e holds a patent on the x-pinch x-ray source for application to lithography in microelectronics manufacturing. His research is supported by DOE and Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque. He is the Chair-Elect of the Division of Plasma Physics of the American Physical Society in 2003, and will be the Chair of the division in 2004.

Happer, William
Princeton University; Department of Energy; University Research Board; MITRE; Marshall Institute; Magnetic Imaging Technologies Incorporated
80's - 90's
Professor in the Department of Physics at Princeton University, is a specialist in modern optics, optical and radiofrequency spectroscopy of atoms and molecules, and spin-polarized atoms and nuclei. From 1991 to 1993, he served as Director of Energy Research in the Department of Energy and on his return to Princeton, he was named Eugene Higgins Professor of Physics and Chair of the University Research Board. Dr. Happer has maintained an interest in applied as well as basic science and he has served as a consultant to numerous firms, charitable foundations and government agencies. From 1987 to 1990 he served as chairman of the Steering Committee of JASON, a group of scientists and engineers who advised the Federal Government on matters of defense and other technical issues. Trustee of the MITRE Corporation, the Richard Lounsbery Foundation, and the Marshall Institute. He was a co-founder in 1994 of Magnetic Imaging Technologies Incorporated (MITI), a small company specializing in the use of laser polarized noble gases for magnetic resonance imaging. Has been a consultant to many companies.

Harvey, J.
Unknown
1990's
Named in the 1991 JASON study 'U.S. Special Operations Command'. He is mentioned in the 1992 JASON studies 'Continuum Approaches for Describing Solid-Liquid Flow' and 'Drag Reduction by Polymer Additives'.

Henderson, Robert
Unknown
90's - 21th
Director of JASON.

Horowitz, Paul
Harvard University
80's - 90's
Professor of Physics & Professor of Electrical Engineering. Paul Horowitz’s research group is currently focused on several problems in experimental astrophysics – the search for intentional microwave transmissions from extraterrestrial intelligent civilizations (SETI), a search for highly redshifted neutral hydrogen condensations (with colleagues at MIT), and optical interferometry (with the IOTA collaboration).

Hwa, Terence
University of California
21th
Professor at the Physics Department of the University of California at San Diego. His lab is focused on the area of quantitative and systemic biology. This is an emerging area of research at the interface of biology, engineering, biochemistry, and statistical physics. In this post-genome era, it is clear that the complexity of a biological organism resides not merely in the intricacies of its components (e.g., proteins), but more importantly in the array of interactions these components can have with each other.

Jeanloz, Raymond
University of California
90's - 21th
Raymond Jeanloz is professor of earth and planetary science and of astronomy at the University of California, Berkeley, where his group studies the nature and evolution of planetary interiors, as well as the properties of materials at high pressures.

Joyce, Gerald F.
University of California; Scripps Research Institute
90's - 21th
Professor at the Departments of Chemistry and Molecular Biology at the Scripps Research Institute. Investigates Darwinian evolution in RNA and DNA molecules.

Kammerdiener, John
University of California; Los Alamos
1990's
Considered one of the principal designers of the US nuclear arsenal. Kammerdiener of Los Alamos is a major designer of the 'secondaries' of thermonuclear weapons. He helped JASON with a 1995 study involving the testing of nuclear weapons without actually detonating one.

Katz, Jonathan I.
Washington University
80's - 21th
Professor of physics at Washington University. Katz's work centers on gamma-ray bursts. He also works on a number of diverse topics in applied physics, biophysics and materials science.

Keller, Joseph B.
Columbia University; Stanford
60's - 70's
Professor (emeritus) of Mathematics and Mechanical Engineering at Stanford University Department of Mathematics. Columbia University Research Assistant, 1944-1945. Stanford visiting professor of Mathematics 1969-1970 & 1976-1978. Professor of Mathematics and Mechanical Engineering since 1978.

Kendall, Henry W.
M.I.T.; Union of Corcerned Scientists
60's - 70's
A professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Kendall won the 1990 Nobel Prize in Physics with Jerome Friedman and Richard Taylor for a series of experiments (1967–1973) that showed that the fundamental particles of matter are not protons and neutrons, but smaller particles known as quarks (see elementary particles). As the founder and chair of the Union of Concerned Scientists, Kendall was openly critical in the 1980s of the Strategic Defense Initiative, or 'Star Wars' antimissile project. During the 1968 Tet-offensive Garwin, Kendall, and two other Pentagon scientists were sent to Vietnam to see how new technology might turn the tables again, especially in Khe Sanh. It is likely they had to give their opinion on the use of tactical nuclear weapons, since rumors had surfaced that the U.S. was preparing to use them.

Kimble, H. Jeff
University of California
1990's
Professor of physics at Caltech. Principal Investigator of the Caltech Quantum Optics group. His group successfully proved the concept of 'quantum teleportation'.

Kistiakowsky, George
University of California; Los Alamos
60's - 70's
Chemistry professor who participated in the Manhattan Project. Born in Kiev, Ukraine, he attended private schools in Kiev and Moscow until the Russian Revolution broke out in 1917. He was imprisoned by the Bolsheviks but later escaped to Germany, where he received his P.H.D in 1925. He joined the Manhattan Project in 1944, replacing Seth Neddermeyer as head of the implosion department. Under his leadership came the complex explosive lenses needed to compress the plutonium sphere uniformly to achieve critical mass. Died in 1982.

Koonin, Steven E.
University of California; DOD; Argonne National Laboratory; CFR; British Petroleum
90's - 21th
Steven Koonin joined the Caltech faculty in 1975, became full professor in 1981, serving as chairman of the Faculty from 1989-1991. Professor Koonin held the position of provost (president) of Caltech from 1995 to 2004. Koonin is a member of the Council for Foreign Relations and has served on a number of advisory committees for the National Science Foundation, the Department of Energy, and the Department of Defense and its various national laboratories. He is a fellow of the American Physical Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. His research interests include theoretical nuclear, many-body, and computational physics, nuclear astrophysics, and global environmental science. He is a member of the Board of Governors of Argonne National Laboratory. Koonin is currently on a leave of absence from his faculty position as professor of theoretical physics to serve as Chief Scientist of BP in London.

Kroll, Norman M.
University of California
60's - 70's
Seen as a brilliant pioneer in Quantum Physics. He was a founding member of
the UCSD Physics department at which he still is a research professor. His interests and research work have dealt with the application of theoretical methods to a variety of areas in physics. These include quantum electrodynamics, quantum field theory, nuclear physics, nonlinear optics, plasma physics, free electron lasers, particle detectors and particle accelerators.

Lederberg, Joshua
Stanford; Yale; Rockefeller University; CFR; NASA
70's - 80's
An American molecular biologist who is known for his work in genetics, artificial intelligence, and space exploration. In 1946 Lederberg and Edward Tatum announced that they had discovered genetic recombination in bacteria. Several years later Lederberg discovered that viruses called bacteriophages could transfer genetic material from one bacterium to another, a phenomenon he called transduction. Won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1958. In addition to his contributions to biology, Lederberg did extensive research in artificial intelligence. This included work in the NASA experimental programs seeking life on Mars and the chemistry expert system DENDRAL. President of the Rockefeller University 1978-1990. His protege, Edward Tatum, with whom he had won the Nobel Prize in 1958, had already joined the staff of Rockefeller University in 1957. At the time it was called the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research. After Lederberg stepped down as president he became professor-emeritus of molecular genetics and informatics at Rockefeller University. Throughout his career, Lederberg was active as a scientific advisor to the U.S. government. Starting in 1950, he has been a member of various panels of the President's Science Advisory Committee. In 1979, he became a member of the U.S. Defense Science Board and the chairman of President Jimmy Carter's President's Cancer Panel. In 1994, he headed the Defense Science Board Task Force on Persian Gulf War Health Effects, which investigated Gulf War Syndrome. It concluded that there was no evidence of a 'special Gulf War Syndrome' and no evidence of biochemical exposures. In April 1998, Lederberg, met with Bill Clinton, Dr. Thomas Monath (vice-president OraVax Corporation), Jerry Hauer (Director New York's Emergency Management), William C. Patrick III, and John Deutsch (CIA Director), to negotiate the first of several multimillion dollar anthrax, smallpox, and West Nile virus vaccine contracts. Lederberg, as chairman, was the only JASON on the GWS panel.

Lederman, Leon M.
Columbia University; University of Chicago
60's - 70's
Internationally renowned high-energy physicist. Won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1988. Professor Lederman was the Eugene Higgins Professor of Physics at Columbia from 1972 to 1979 and served as Director of Nevis Laboratories in Irvington, Columbia's center for experimental research in high-energy physics, from 1962 to 1979. Director (emeritus) of Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Batavia, Illinois (1979-1989) and holds an appointment as Pritzker Professor of Science at Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago. Dr. Lederman served as Chairman of the State of Illinois Governor's Science Advisory Committee. In 1990 he was elected President of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the largest scientific organization in the U.S.

Leith, C.
Unknown
1990's
He is mentioned in the 1992 JASON study 'CHAMMP Review' about a new DOE program designed to move climate models from the current generation of supercomputers to massively parallel computers of the future (like JASON Norman Christ started to work on).

Lelevier, Robert E.
RAND
70's - 21th
Received the Ph.D. degree in. theoretical physics in 1952 from the UCLA. 1997 email address was lelevier@rand.org. Already named as a member of RAND in 1972. Levine, Herbert University of California

90's - 21th

Professor of physics. His interest is in the physics of nonequilibrium processes, especially in the emergence of spatial patterns in extended systems. Within this framework, he works on issues arising in condensed matter physics, chemical physics and most recently biophysics.

Lewis, Harold W.
University of California
60's - 70's
Professor of Physics at U.S. Santa Barbara. Was chairman of the Jason group in 1972.

Lewis, Nathan S.
University of California
90's - 21th
Professor of Chemistry at Caltech. The research interests of Professor Lewis and his group deal with light-induced electron transfer reactions, both at surfaces and in transition metal complexes. Another major area of research in Professor Lewis' group involves novel uses of conducting organic polymers.

Long, Darrell D. E.
University of California
21th
Dr. Darrell D. E. Long is Professor of Computer Science and Kumar Malavalli Endowed Professor of Storage Systems Research at the University of California, Santa Cruz, Associate Dean for Research and Graduate Studies and Director of the Storage Systems Research Center in the Jack Baskin School of Engineering. He has broad research interests in the area of computing systems including operating systems, distributed systems, high performance storage systems, fault tolerance, performance evaluation and mobile computing. His research is supported by the National Science Foundation, the Office of Naval Research, the Naval Research Laboratory, the Department of Energy (Lawrence Livermore, Los Alamos and Sandia National Laboratories), IBM, HP, and Microsoft.

MacDonald, Gordon J.F.
University of California; Dartmouth College; President's Council of Environmental Quality; NASA; CFR
70's - 90's
MacDonald is director of the environmental studies program at Dartmouth College in Hanover, N.H. Formerly, he was a consultant to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and a professor of geophysics at UCLA. In 1966, MacDonald was a member of the President's Science Advisory Committee and later a member of the President's Council on Environmental Quality. One of MacDonald's predictions in the 1970's was that by 2018 the weather will be so controllable that droughts and storms could be used as weapons. He has published papers on this subject. According to Nexus Magazine, the following statement was made more than 25 years ago in a book which Brzezinski wrote while a professor at Columbia University: "Political strategists are tempted to exploit research on the brain and human behaviour. Geophysicist Gordon J. F. MacDonald-specialist in problems of warfare-says accurately-timed, artificially-excited electronic strokes 'could lead to a pattern of oscillations that produce relatively high power levels over certain regions of the Earth... In this way, one could develop a system that would seriously impair the brain performance of very large populations in selected regions over an extended period..."

Max, Claire E.
University of California
80's - 21th
Founding director of Livermore Branch, Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics 1984-1993. Professor of Astronomy and Astrophysics. Professor and astronomer at the University of California since 2001. Director at the Center for Adaptive Optics since 2004.

McEuen, Paul L.
University of California; Cornell University
21th
Professor of physics. Research areas: The science and technology of nanostructures, particularly carbon-based systems such as nanotubes and C60 molecules; novel fabrication techniques at the nanometer scale; scanned probe microscopy of nanostructures; assembly and measurement of chemical and biological nanostructures.

Meiron, Dan
University of California
21th
Professor of applied mathematics at Caltech. As a JASON involved with testing the nuclear stockpile without actually detonating one.

Montroll, Elliott
University of Maryland; University of Rochester; IBM
60's - 70's

Elliott Montroll was a research professor at the University of Maryland Institute of Fluid Dynamics and Applied Mathematics from 1951 to 1960. He also held many government positions and was the founding editor of the Journal of Mathematical Physics. His papers include lecture notes and research materials for the publication of articles on various aspects of physics and chemistry. Died in 1983.

Muller, Richard A.
University of California; Lawrence Livermore; M.I.T.
70's - 21th
Professor of Physics who works at the University of California, Berkeley and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. His work has included attempting to understand the ice ages, dynamics at the core-mantle boundary, patterns of extinction and biodiversity through time, and the processes associated with impact cratering. One of his most well known proposals is the Nemesis hypothesis. Today, Dr. Muller teaches "Physics for Future Presidents" [1] which is a course designed to teach the concepts of physics relevant to important policy decisions such as nuclear proliferation, climate change, space travel, and energy policy. For several years, he was a monthly columnist with MIT's Technology Review.

Munk, Walter H.
University of California
70's - 21th
Professor of geophysics. Elected to NAS in 1956. For the last 20 years he has worked on the development of 'Ocean Acoustic Tomography' as a technique of mapping ocean temperature. This includes 'Acoustic Thermometry of Ocean Climate' (ATOC) to monitor ocean variability on the climate scale. Lately he has worked on the dissipation of tidal energy and its role in ocean mixing.

Nelson, David R.
Harvard University
80's - 21th
Professor of Physics at Harvard University's Department of Physics. David Nelson’s research focuses on collective effects in the physics and chemistry of condensed matter. He has been interested, in particular, in the interplay between fluctuations, geometry and statistical mechanics. In collaboration with his Harvard colleague, Bertrand I. Halperin, he is responsible for a theory of dislocation-mediated melting in two dimensions.

Nierenberg, William A.
University of California; Scripps Institution of Oceanography; SEPP; NATO; State Department; CFR
70's - 90's
Director of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography 1965 through 1986. Member of the Board of Science Advisors at Science and Environmental Policy Project (SEPP). Science advisor to NATO and the U.S. State Department. He served on the advisory board of the Electric Power Research Institute. Director of the George C. Marshall Institute. Chairman of the first National Academy of Sciences study on the greenhouse effect, possible sea-level rises, and climate change, which was conducted in the early part of the eighties (titled: 'Changing Climate'). Frequent visitor of New York and well known at the Rockefeller University. According to a September 28, 2000 Memorial Tribute posted on the Rockefeller University website, Detlev Bronk, president of the Rockefeller University, member of the Pilgrims Society, and an alledged member of the first MJ-12 group, had been a patron of Nierenberg's career. Nierenberg died in 2000.

Novick, (Melvin) Robert
Unknown
80's - 90's
Already named a member of JASON in 1987. He is mentioned in the 1996 JASON study 'Inertial Confinement Fusion (ICF) Review'.

Panofsky, Wolfgang K.H.
University of California; Stanford; Princeton University; PSAC; CFR
60's - 90's
Involved in different projects at the UC, including the Manhattan Project 1942-1951. Professor of Physics at Stanford University since 1951 where he worked at the High Energy Physics Laboratory and SLAC. On the Advisory Council of the Department of Physics of Princeton University 1959-1961. Consultant of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency 1959-1980. President's Science Advisory Committee 1960-1964. Steering committee of JASON at the Institute for Defense Analyses 1965-1973 (officially still a member of JASON today). On the Advisory Committees of Brookhaven National Laboratory, Physics Dept. of the University of Rochester, and the Physics, Mathematics & Astronomy Deptartments of Caltech. Member of Nuclear Energy Policy Study of the Ford Foundation 1977-1978. General Advisory Committee to the President 1978-1980. Chairman of the Committee on International Security and Arms Control 1985-1993 (member since 1981). Chairman of the Board of Overseers-SSC of the Universities Research Association.

Perkins, Francis W., Jr.
Princeton University
70's - 21th
Principal research physicist at Princeton's plasma physics lab. Retired in 2005 after 38 years of service.

Peterson, Allen M.
Stanford
70's - 90's
Professor of Electrical Engineering and Senior Scientific Advisor. Died in 1994.

Peurifoy, Robert
Sandia National Laboratories
1990's
Former vice president of Sandia National Laboratory. In 2003 he said (like most other JASON's): "If you can find somebody in a uniform in the Defense Department who can talk about new need for nuclear bunker busters without laughing, I’ll buy him a cup of coffee. It’s outlandish. It’s stupid. It is an effort to maintain a payroll at the weapons labs." Peurifoy was in charge there of all of the non-physics aspects of stockpile nuclear weapons-- especially the Arming, Firing, and Fuzing, as well as packaging, and the like. Drell and Peurifoy published an authoritative article on stockpile maintenance. Robert Peurifoy was a giant in the field of construction engineering and authored several classic books during his lifetime. He helped JASON in 1995 and 1999 when they were conducting studies about the nuclear weapons arsenal.

Prentiss, Mara
M.I.T.
90's - 21th
Professor of physics. Prentiss is head of the Consortium for Light Force Dynamics, through which the group collaborates with NIST at Gaithersburg, Colorado State University, and the Harvard Chemistry Department. Other atom optics research has included theoretical and experimental work on focusing and beamsplitting techniques, including research with the Westervelt (also a JASON) group using magnetic fields to control atomic motion.

Press, William H.
Princeton University; Harvard University; University of California; Los Alamos; U.S. Defense Science Board; Chief of Naval Operations' Executive Panel; IDA
80's - 90's
Professor of Astronomy and of Physics at Harvard University since 1976. Came to Los Alamos in 1998. Earlier, Press was Assistant Professor of Physics at Princeton University, and Richard Chace Tolman Research Fellow in Theoretical Physics at Caltech, where he received his Ph.D. in physics in 1972. Press, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, has published more than 140 papers in the areas of theoretical astrophysics, cosmology, and computational algorithms. Past co-Chair of the Commission on Physical Sciences, Mathematics, and Applications (CPSMA) of the National Research Council (NRC); a past member of the NRC's Computer Science and Telecommunications Board, the Astronomy and Astrophysics Survey Committee, the Chief of Naval Operations' Executive Panel, the U.S. Defense Science Board, and a variety of other boards and committees. Trustee of the Institute for Defense Analyses (IDA) and serves on its Executive Committee. In 2000, he became a founding member of the Computer and Information Sciences Section of the National Academy of Sciences, and he serves as section liason to the National Research Council.

Prince, T.
Unknown
1990's
In 1997 he was a member of the JASON study 'Human Genome Project'.

Richter, Burton
Stanford
70's - 80's Worked at the Stanford High Energy Physics Laboratory and Linear Accelerator Center from 1956 to 1999. Director at Varian Medical Systems, Litel Instruments Inc., AREVA Enterprises Inc. , and the International Council for Science. Member of the Secretary of Energy Advisory Board. President of the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics (IUPAP) 1999-2002. Chairman of the Board on Physics and Astronomy since 2003. Board on Physics and Astronomy.

Ride, S.
Unknown
1990's
This person could have been the former astronaut / Stanford & UCSD physicist Sally Ride. Mentioned in the 1990 JASON study 'Verification Technology: Unclassified Version'.

Rosenbluth, Marshall N.
Stanford; Princeton University; University of Texas; University of California
70's - 21th
Professor of Physics. Instructor at Stanford University (1949-1950), where he derived the elastic scattering cross section of electron off protons. This famous 'Rosenbluth formula' was the basis of the analysis used by Robert Hofstadter in his Nobel prize-winning experimental investigation. Joined Los Alamos Laboratory as a staff member from 1950-1956 to participate in the nation's weapons program where he became a leading member of the team that developed the hydrogen bomb. During his career in Los Alamos, he began his life-long quest to develop controlled fusion into a viable energy source. Became a professor at the Princeton Institute of Advanced Study in 1967. In 1980, Marshall Rosenbluth moved to The University of Texas at Austin, as professor and director of the newly-formed Institute of Fusion Studies (IFS). Headed the Plasma Theory group at the University of California together with JASON professor Patrick Diamond. Deceased in 2003. He was often referred to as the 'pope of plasma physics'.

Rothaus, Oscar S.
NSA; Cornell; Princeton University; University of California
80's - 90's
Professor of mathematics. Mathematician for the National Security Agency in Washington, DC 1953-1960. Deputy Director of the Institute for Defense Analyses in Princeton 1960-1965. Professor at the Mathematics Department of Cornell University 1966-2003. Chairman of the Mathematics Department 1973-1976. Oscar was an outstanding contributor to the areas of several complex variables and Sobolev inequalities.

Ruderman, Malvin A.
Columbia University
70's - 21th
Professor of physics and theoretical astrophysics at Columbia University. He works mainly on problems associated with collapsed objects in astrophysics, especially neutron stars.

Sack, Seymour
University of California; Lawrence Livermore
1990's
One of Lawrence Livermore's key nuclear weapons designers. He played a role in the design of the egg-shaped primaries for the warheads of the MX, Poseidon, Minuteman, and Trident missiles.

Sands, Matthew
University of California; Stanford
60's - 70's
Professor of physics. Sands was an active faculty member at UC Santa Cruz from 1969 to 1985 and continued his research activities until 1994. After retiring from UCSC, Sands worked as a consultant for SLAC and also as a computer consultant for Bay View Elementary School in Santa Cruz.

Schwitters, Roy F.
Stanford; Harvard University; University of Texas
90's - 21th
Professor of physics. Associate and assistant professor at Stanford Linear Accelerator Center 1971-1979. Professor of Physics at Harvard University 1979-1990. Director at the Superconducting Super Collider Laboratory 1989-1993. Present S.W. Richardson Regents Professor of Physics at the University of Texas since 1990. Chairman of the Department of Physics at the University of Texas since 2001.

Slichter, Charles P.
University of Illinois
60's - 70's
Professor of physics. Internationally recognized in condensed matter physics, became a member of the Illinois physics faculty in 1949. He is one of the world's top research scientists in the area of magnetic resonance and has been a leading innovator in applications of resonance techniques to understanding the structure of matter.

Sorenson, Harold W.
University of California; Air Force; DIA; Orincon Corporation International (subsidiary of Lockheed Martin); MITRE
1980's
A founding faculty member of UCSD and a long-time scientific and technology advisor to the United States defense and intelligence communities. Co-founder of Orincon, the systems integration company. He served as chief scientist of the U.S. Air Force from 1985 to 1988 and arrived at MITRE in 1989, remaining until 2001. He chaired the Air Force Scientific Advisory Board from 1990 to 1993 and was a member of the Defense Intelligence Association Scientific Advisory Board from 1992 to 1986.

Spiess, Fred N.
University of California; Scripps Institution of Oceanography; Navel Research Advisory
Committee
1980's
Professor of physics. Professor of Oceanography at the Marine Physical Laboratory of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Joined the Marine Physical Laboratory at Scripps in 1952 and began his research career in underwater acoustics and sonar systems. Over the years, this broadened into activity in ocean engineering; design of FLIP, deeply towed instrument systems, ODP wireline re-entry, seafloor geodetic techniques, and related seagoing marine geophysics and graduate student education. From 1980-1988, Dr. Spiess was director of the University of California Institute of Marine Resources, the agency that administered the California Sea Grant Program at the time.

Stearns, Tim
Stanford University
21th
Associate Professor of Biological Sciences and Genetics at Stanford University School of Medicine. Tim Stearns’s research focuses on cell biology, particularly the microtubule cytoskeleton, a dynamic network of filaments and associated motors and organizing factors found in all eukaryotic cells. He will create a program that will train undergraduates to be the next generation of leaders in biological research through close interaction with faculty members in course work, research, and advising.

Steinhardt, Paul J.
Princeton University
80's - 90's
Professor of physics. Paul J. Steinhardt is the Albert Einstein Professor in Science at Princeton University, a member of the faculty in the Department of Physics and an associate faculty member in the Department of Astrophysical Sciences. Steinhardt is a theorist whose research spans problems in particle physics, astrophysics, cosmology and condensed matter physics. He is one of the architects of the 'inflationary model' of the universe, an important modification of the standard big bang picture which explains the homogeneity and geometry of the universe and the origin of the fluctuations that seeded the formation of galaxies and large-scale structure. He introduced the concepts of 'quintessence,' a dynamical form of dark energy that may account for the recently discovered cosmic acceleration.

Stubbs, Christopher
Harvard University
21th
Professor of Physics at Harvard. Christopher Stubbs is an experimental physicist working at the interface between particle physics, cosmology and gravitation. His interests include experimental tests of the foundations of gravitational physics, searches for dark matter, and observational cosmology. He is one of the principal investigators on an ambitious survey that will use hundreds of supernovae to map out the recent expansion history of the Universe.

Sullivan, Jeremiah D.
Stanford; U.S. government; NATO
80's - 21th
Professor of physics. He spent his postdoctoral years as a research associate in the theoretical physics group at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC), then moved to Illinois, beginning as an acting assistant professor and advancing rapidly through the professorial ranks. In the early years of his career, Sullivan made significant contributions to particle physics, particularly to electromagnetic interactions and to hadron-hadron processes at high energy. In 1974, Sullivan began what ultimately developed into his major research direction when he accepted an invitation to become a member of JASON, a group of experts who provide technical analyses to the U.S. government on scientific issues relevant to national security. Every summer since 1974, he has spent six weeks working with the JASON group and has contributed significantly to its success. In addition to his direct JASON work, Professor Sullivan has also leant his expertise to a number of other important studies and reviews that have played key roles in the evolution of U.S. defense policy over the past twenty years. In 2001, he was selected by the Secretary of Energy to lead the Nuclear Nonproliferation Subcommittee of the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration Advisory Committee and received a four-year appointment to the Advisory Panel of the security-related Civil Science and Technology Sub-Programme of the NATO Science Committee.

Tonry, John L.
Harvard University; University of California; M.I.T.; University of Hawaii
21th
Professor of physics who did research at Harvard, Caltech, MIT, and now at the University of Hawaii's Institute for Astronomy.

Townes, Charles H.
University of California; Columbia University; Bell Labs; NASA; General Motors; PSAC; State Department; IDA
60's - 70's
Professor of physics and astronomy. Born in 1915. B.A. and a B.S. from Furman University. M.A. from Duke University in 1937. Ph.D. in physics from Caltech in 1939. Member of the technical staff of Bell Telephone Laboratories from 1933 to 1947. Remains a consultant to Bell Labs in the decades ahead. Worked extensively during World War II in designing radar bombing systems and has a number of patents in related technology. Executive director of the Columbia Radiation Laboratory 1950-1952 and chairman of the Physics Department 1952-1955. Builds the first maser (early version of laser, producing microwave rather than optical radiation) with J. P. Gordon and H. J. Zeiger at Columbia in 1953. Vice president and director of research of the Institute for Defense Analyses 1959-1961. Helped set up IDA and JASON. Nobel Prize in Physics 1964. Provost and Professor of Physics at MIT 1961-1966. Became professor at the University of California in 1966. Chairman NASA Science Advisory Committee for the Apollo lunar landing program 1966-1970. Chairman of the Defense Department’s Committee on the MX missile. First chairman of the General Motors Science Advisory Committee, founded in 1971. Director General Motors since 1974. Together with Laurance S. Rockefeller and William O. Baker (president Bell Labs at the time; NSA affiliated), Townes sat on the initial board of the General Motors Cancer Research Foundation, founded in 1978. In his 1995 book 'Making Waves', Pg. 199: "The proposed position for me was Vice President and Director of Research for the Institute for Defense Analysis. The Institute was a nonprofit "think-tank with a very important role, run by five or six prominent universities on the East Coast, Columbia University being one of them. It managed what was known as the Weapons Systems Evaluation Group. We had to pick the right people who would be responsible for analyzing how and whether a weapon worked and its effectiveness. We also advised a new organization, the Advanced Research Projects Agency, whose aim was to consider what could be done in space, and to help initiate new ideas and technologies of importance to national security. We also advised the State Department on arms control problems."

Treiman, Sam B.
Princeton University
80's - 90's
Professor of physics. Considered one of the founders of modern particle physics and his imprint can be found all over the subject.

Vesecky, John F.
University of Michigan; University of California
80's - 21th
Professor of Electrical Engineering. John Vesecky's technical interests are in the areas of remote sensing of the ocean surface; ocean current measuring radar for coastal ecology and oceanography, radar and radar systems, especially synthetic aperture radar (SAR); wave scattering; remote sensing and public health. Prior to joining the faculty at UCSC he was a Professor of Atmospheric, Oceanic and Space Sciences at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.

Watson, Kenneth M.
University of California
60's - 90's
Professor of physics and an expert in plasma physics and scattering theory. One of the co-founders of JASON in 1959. At a faculty meeting during the time of the Cambodian invasion (during the Vietnam war - 1970) Watson was heard to comment, "Why is everyone getting so upset about such a little war?" Became a director of the Mari...

[Thomas Graves]

They used to meet in my hometown of La Jolla, California.

--Tommy