About UChicago Argonne, LLC
Board of Governors
Sidney R. Nagel, Ph.D.
- Member, UChicago Argonne, LLC Board of Governors for Argonne National Laboratory
- Stein-Freiler Distinguished Service Professor, Department of Physics, James Franck Institute, The University of Chicago
Sidney Nagel specializes in the physics of solids, liquids and granular materials. Much of his work has drawn attention to phenomena scientists have regarded as outside the realm of traditional physics, including the physics of granular materials such as sand and coffee stains, which appear to be simple but in fact involve deep scientific issues.
His work has included developing ways to protect transplanted cells used to fight diabetes and other diseases.
Nagel was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2003 and is a fellow of the American Physical Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Other honors include a fellowship from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation from 1979 to 1981, the University of Chicago 's Quantrell Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching in 1996, the Klopsteg Memorial Award of the American Association of Physics Teachers in 1998 and the American Physical Society's Oliver Buckley Prize in 1999. In 1990, Nagel presented the Niels Bohr Lecture at the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen, Denmark.
Nagel received his B.A. in physics from Columbia University in 1969 and his Ph.D. in physics from Princeton University in 1974. He joined the University of Chicago faculty in 1976, following two years as a research associate at Brown University. He was appointed to a Louis Block Professorship in Physical Sciences in 1998 and named the Stein-Freiler Distinguished Service Professor in physics in 2001.
He directed Chicago 's Materials Research Laboratory from 1987 to 1991 and served as Master of the Physical Sciences Collegiate Division and Associate Dean of the Division of Physical Sciences and the College from 1997 to 2000. He was named to Argonne 's Board of Governors in 2003.
