May 30, 2007

Richard Heese Receives 2007 UEC Community Service Award

It’s the pleasure of the NSLS Users’ Executive Committee (UEC) to present the 2007 UEC Community Service Award to Richard Heese, a senior scientist at BNL in the Operations Division of the NSLS. This award is given for service, innovation, and dedication to users of the NSLS, and Richard is well deserving of that honor.

Richard Heese

Richard Heese came to the NSLS in 1978 having previously built the Linac at the University of Saskatoon, which recently became part of the injector for the Canadian Light Source. He was involved in the design and initial construction of the NSLS, with particular emphasis on the injection system. He left the project in 1981 to work as a medical physicist at McGill University in Montreal and was drawn back to the NSLS in late 1984 to support the operations and continuing development of the facility. He was promoted to senior scientist in 1985 and has been a key player for more than 20 years in delivering the high reliability and performance that are so much a part of the NSLS user experience.

To honor several decades of dedicated support for NSLS experimenters in the most important way possible (by providing beam!), members of the NSLS user community nominated Richard Heese for this year’s award. Statements by users and staff in support of his nomination include:

“Last Fourth of July weekend, when we were all off after a wonderfully long weekend, I returned to the NSLS at 8:30 in the morning to start an experiment. Richard Heese was just leaving. I jokingly asked him if he had been here all night and he said `yes!’ There were problems with the x-ray ring and Richard had stayed here all night working on this ring so there would be beam for users in the morning.”

“As Richard is fond of pointing out, the NSLS served as a proof of principle for the Chasman-Green lattice (the cornerstone of most modern light sources including NSLS-II) and was built with a very tight budget at a time of high inflation. Much of the original facility was ‘borrowed’ from other places and made to work. This required tremendous ingenuity on the part of the staff, and Richard’s breadth and depth of experience were a great resource so people understood what was important to work on, and what was ‘good enough for now.’ This well of knowledge and experience exhibited itself time and again in the operation of the facility, particularly in knowing how to ‘work around’ deteriorating equipment so operations could continue to schedule maintenance periods. Innumerable experiments have been saved over the years by Richard’s ability to nurse the machines along, and work for their strategic improvement, always keeping the needs of the User Community in mind. His pragmatic approach and dedication to keeping the machines running have been a hallmark of his many years of devoted service to the NSLS user community.”

“Richard’s total dedication to making the NSLS run always exceeds expectations and could make us complacent and expect photons as routinely as we expect electricity from the Long Island Power Authority (LIPA)! The NSLS community owes much to Richard for his longstanding work.”

Dan Fischer presented the award to Richard at the NSLS Users’ Meeting on May 22. Richard received a $250 gift certificate and his name was engraved on the plaque displayed in the NSLS lobby. Congratulations, Richard, and thanks for a job well done.

ARTICLE BY: Chris Jacobsen, UEC Chair