Sidney D. Drell

Director of SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory until 1998

Sidney D. Drell is a senior fellow at its Hoover Institution and a professor of theoretical physics (emeritus) at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Stanford University. He served as SLAC’s Deputy Director until retiring in 1998. An arms control specialist, he has served as an adviser to the executive and legislative branches of government on national security and defense technical issues for more than four decades. A member of the National Academy of Sciences, Drell is active in JASON, a group of academic scientists who consult for the government on issues of national importance.

Among numerous previous advisory roles, Drell served as a member of the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board and the President’s Science Advisory Committee. He also chaired the Panel on Nuclear Weapons Safety of the House Armed Services Committee, the Technology Review Panel of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, and the Senior Review Board of the Intelligence Community’s Technology Innovation Center.

In recognition of his research achievements in physics and contributions to U.S. national security and public policy, Drell has received numerous awards, including the Enrico Fermi Award, the nation’s oldest award in science and technology, a prize fellowship of the MacArthur Foundation, the Heinz Award for his contributions in public policy, the Rumford Medal from the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the National Intelligence Distinguished Service Medal, and was one of ten scientists honored as “founders of national reconnaissance as a space discipline” by the U.S. National Reconnaissance Office.

Writing

• The Nuclear Threat: a new start
  Appeared in Physics World • February 2, 2009