Wick Haxton

Haxton grew up in Santa Cruz,{{cite web |title=Wick Haxton (Oral History) |url=https://www.aip.org/history-programs/niels-bohr-library/oral-histories/47187 |website=American Institute of Physics |access-date=24 May 2023 |language=en |date=6 April 2022}} studied from 1967 at the University of California, Santa Cruz (BA in physics and mathematics 1971) and received his doctorate in 1976 at Stanford University for his work on Semileptonic Weak Interactions in Complex Nuclei (1975).{{cite book |last1=Haxton |first1=W. |last2=Bertsch |first2=G. |last3=Henley |first3=E. M. |title=Institute for Nuclear Theory. Annual report No. 3, 1 March 1992--28 February 1993 |date=1 July 1993 |publisher=Washington Univ., Seattle, WA (United States) |page=A1 |doi=10.2172/10165676 |url=https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/10165676 |language=English}}

From 1975 to 1977 he worked at the Institute for Nuclear Physics of the University of Mainz and then until 1985 as Oppenheimer Fellow in the theoretical division of the Los Alamos National Laboratory. After a year as assistant professor at Purdue University in 1984 he became associate professor and in 1987 professor at the University of Washington. He remained there as professor of physics and astronomy until 2009, serving from 1991 to 2006 as director of the National Institute for Nuclear Theory (INT). In 2009 he left the University of Washington to become professor of physics at the University of California, Berkeley and senior faculty scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.{{cite web |title=Wick Haxton: A Polymath's Approach to Nuclear Theory - Berkeley Lab |url=https://newscenter.lbl.gov/2009/09/30/wick-haxton/ |website=Berkeley Lab News Center |access-date=24 May 2023 |date=30 September 2009}}

Haxton is engaged in nuclear astrophysics (supernovae, the solar neutrino problem, nucleosynthesis), neutrino physics (neutrino oscillations, neutrinoless double beta decay, neutrino properties), many-body theory (effective theories) in nuclear physics (as well as in atomic physics and condensed matter physics), and tests of symmetries of fundamental interactions (parity, CP-symmetry, lepton number).

Haxton and his colleagues put forward a method for the formulation of an effective field theory for shell model using the harmonic oscillator basis as a regulator.{{cite journal |last1=Binder |first1=S. |last2=Ekström |first2=Jan A. |last3=Hagen |first3=Gaute |last4=Papenbrock |first4=Thomas F. |last5=Wendt |first5=Kyle A. |title=Effective field theory in the harmonic oscillator basis |journal=Physical Review C |date=25 April 2016 |volume=93 |issue=4 |page=044332 |doi=10.1103/PhysRevC.93.044332 |s2cid=85457544 |url=https://www.osti.gov/pages/servlets/purl/1302893 |access-date=25 May 2023 |language=English |issn=2469-9985|arxiv=1512.03802 |bibcode=2016PhRvC..93d4332B }}{{cite journal |last1=Stroberg |first1=S. Ragnar |last2=Hergert |first2=Heiko |last3=Bogner |first3=Scott K. |last4=Holt |first4=Jason D. |title=Nonempirical Interactions for the Nuclear Shell Model: An Update |journal=Annual Review of Nuclear and Particle Science |date=19 October 2019 |volume=69 |issue=1 |pages=307–362 |doi=10.1146/annurev-nucl-101917-021120 |s2cid=119021672 |url=https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/full/10.1146/annurev-nucl-101917-021120 |access-date=25 May 2023 |language=en |issn=0163-8998|arxiv=1902.06154 |bibcode=2019ARNPS..69..307S }}

He led the early efforts to convert the Homestake Mine in South Dakota to scientific use as the Deep Underground Science and Engineering Laboratory, but left the project after the mine was flooded in 2003.{{cite news |last1=Malakoff |first1=David |title=Homestake Hopes Dampened |url=https://www.science.org/content/article/homestake-hopes-dampened |access-date=25 May 2023 |work=Science |date=4 Jun 2003 |language=en}}{{cite journal |last1=Dawson |first1=Jim |title=South Dakota Governor Pushes for Underground Lab as Homestake Water Rises |journal=Physics Today |date=August 2003 |volume=56 |issue=8 |pages=24–25 |doi=10.1063/1.1611345 |doi-access=free |bibcode=2003PhT....56h..24D }}{{cite news |last1=Chang |first1=Kenneth |title=At Former Mine, Battle Rages Over Planned Lab |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/09/us/at-former-mine-battle-rages-over-planned-lab.html |access-date=25 May 2023 |work=The New York Times |date=9 June 2003}}

Haxton has been a consultant for Los Alamos National Laboratory, Argonne National Laboratory, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Brookhaven National Laboratory, TRIUMF, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and various other laboratories and university facilities over the past two decades.{{cite web |title=VITA: Wick C. Haxton |url=https://archive.int.washington.edu/cv_webversion.pdf |website=National Institute for Nuclear Theory |access-date=25 May 2023}}

He is a Fellow of the American Physical Society (1987),{{cite web |title=APS Fellow Archive |url=https://www.aps.org/programs/honors/fellowships/archive-all.cfm?initial=H&year=2017 |website=American Physical Society |access-date=25 May 2023 |language=en}} and in the 1990s served as chair of the Division of Nuclear Physics and the Division of Astrophysics. He is a member of the United States National Academy of Sciences (1999), and a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences,{{cite web |title=Wick C. Haxton |url=https://www.amacad.org/person/wick-c-haxton |website=American Academy of Arts & Sciences |access-date=25 May 2023 |language=en |date=25 May 2023}} the American Association for the Advancement of Science (1988), and the Washington State Academy of Sciences.{{cite web |title= 2021-2022 Membership Directory |url=https://washacad.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/2021-22-Membership-Directory-Public.pdf |website=Washington State Academy of Sciences |access-date=25 May 2023}}

He was a Guggenheim Fellow (2000–2001),{{cite web |title=Wick Haxton |url=https://www.gf.org/fellows/wick-haxton/ |website=John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation... |access-date=25 May 2023}} Visiting Miller Professor at Berkeley (2001),{{cite web |title=Miller Institute Members |url=https://miller.berkeley.edu/images/events/50/50_final-program.pdf |website=Miller Institute for Basic Research in Science celebrating 50 years |access-date=25 May 2023}} Bethe Lecturer at Cornell University (2001){{cite news |last1=Brand |first1=David |title=Physicist to ponder fate of universe in Bethe lectures at Cornell |url=https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2001/04/physicist-ponder-fate-universe-bethe-lectures |access-date=24 May 2023 |work=Cornell Chronicle |date=April 11, 2001 |language=en}} and received the 2004 Hans Bethe Prize of the American Physical Society for his contributions and scientific leadership in neutrino astrophysics and especially for the connection of nuclear physics theory with experiments and observations in nuclear astrophysics and astrophysics (eulogy).{{cite web |title=2004 Hans A. Bethe Prize Recipient |url=https://www.aps.org/programs/honors/prizes/prizerecipient.cfm?last_nm=Haxton&first_nm=Wick&year=2004 |website=American Physical Society |access-date=25 May 2023 |language=en}}

He is a member of the American Philosophical Society (2024).{{cite web |title=Wick Haxton Elected to the American Philosophical Society |url=https://physics.berkeley.edu/news/wick-haxton-elected-american-philosophical-society/ |website=UC Berkeley Physics |access-date=23 Sep 2024}}

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Category:1949 births

Category:Living people

Category:People from Santa Cruz, California

Category:University of California, Santa Cruz alumni

Category:Stanford University alumni

Category:University of Washington faculty

Category:University of California, Berkeley faculty

Category:Los Alamos National Laboratory personnel

Category:Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences

Category:21st-century American physicists

Category:Fellows of the American Physical Society

Category:Members of the American Philosophical Society