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Colloquium | Physics

Steven C. Pieper: Nuclear Physicist at the Computational Frontier

PHY Colloquium/Symposium in Honor of Steven C. Pieper

Abstract: Steven C. Pieper was a distinguished computational and theoretical nuclear physicist at Argonne from 1972 to 2018. His work emphasized solving hard problems in theoretical nuclear physics with groundbreaking calculations. He was a co-author of the widely used Ptolemy code for direct heavy-ion reactions, contributed significantly to the development of the Speakeasy computer language, and was a leader in the application of quantum Monte Carlo methods for nuclear structure and reactions. He also advised and helped colleagues at Argonne and around the world in many crucial ways.

Steve was a Fellow of the American Physical Society and a recipient of the 2000 University of Chicago Medal for Distinguished Performance at Argonne and the 2010 American Physical Society Tom W. Bonner Prize in Nuclear Physics.

This talk will attempt to summarize his career in physics by highlighting a number of his seminal contributions, and wlll also indicate some of the future possibilities that follow from his legacy.