3 U. physicists receiving top honors

The University of Utah Physics Department is surging to the forefront of scientific research, with the American Physical Society awarding top honors to three of its scientists.

The awards to the U.'s Pierre V. Sokolsky, dean of science, and George Cassiday, both physics professors, and Z. Valy Vardeny, whose title is distinguished professor of physics, will be made in March and April during APS meetings.

With a membership of 46,000, the society is the most prestigious group in the world devoted to the study and dissemination of the knowledge of physics. The awards reflect research on detecting and deciphering cosmic rays (Sokolsky and Cassiday), and on optical properties of complex materials (Vardeny).

Sokolsky and Cassiday will split the $10,000 W.K.H. Panofsky Prize in Experimental Particle Physics. Vardeny will share the $5,000 Frank Isakson Prize for Optical Effects in Solids with research partner Professor Joseph Orenstein of the University of California, Berkeley.

The citation for the Panofsky Prize lauds the scientists "for the pioneering development of the atmospheric fluorescence technique as a method for exploring the highest energy cosmic rays." The Isakson Prize honors Vardeny and Orenstein "for pioneering contributions to the understanding of optical phenomena in complex materials including conducting polymers, semiconductors and high temperature superconductors."

"The fact that all three of us got it at the same time is neat," said Sokolsky.

According to the dean, this may be the first time that the annual Panofsky Prize was given for a particle physics experiment not carried out in an accelerator laboratory, but in open air. The award was for the cosmic ray observatories that the U. has set up, originally at Dugway Proving Ground and now in the desert of Millard County.

The award shows that cosmic ray detection "has really now become a mature, well-respected field," he said. It is a way of telling all the scientists who have worked hard for the past three decades developing the detection programs that their colleagues think the field is mature enough that they're going to be treated the same as researchers in the huge national labs, according to Sokolsky.

He did not expect the prize. "This one was out of left field. No clue as to why they gave it to us."

Sokolsky prefers to think of it as recognition to the whole community of cosmic ray scientists at the U.