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SLAC's Burton Richter wins Enrico Fermi award

Nobel Prize winner Burton Richter, director of the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC) in Menlo Park from 1984 to 1999, and Mildred S. Dresselhaus are winners of the Enrico Fermi Award, one of the government's most prestigious awards for scientific achievement.

The presidential award carries an honorarium of $50,000, shared equally, and a gold medal. It is administered on behalf of the White House by the U.S. Department of Energy. Secretary of Energy Steven Chu will present the Fermi award at a ceremony in Washington at a later date.

Mr. Richter's work includes development and exploitation of accelerator technologies that have resulted in several Nobel Prize winning discoveries and his own Nobel Prize winning discovery in experimental particle physics in 1976.

Since stepping down as SLAC director in 1999, Mr. Richter has chaired the Nuclear Energy Research Advisory Committee in the Department of Energy, where he was a principal adviser to the Deputy Secretary of Energy on the development of the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership.

He served for six years on the Secretary of Energy Advisory Board and now serves on the newly established Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy Advisory Board.

A Palo Alto resident, Mr. Richter is an emeritus professor of physical sciences at Stanford University.

Ms. Dresselhaus is a professor emeritus at MIT. Her portfolio of research accomplishments includes many discoveries leading to understanding in various condensed matter systems. She is considered a premier mentor and spokesperson for women in science.