July 5, 2007 - SLAC Announces New Director and Deputy Director of Particle and Particle Astrophysics - Press Release

David MacFarlane and Steve Kahn       (Click on image for larger version)

Menlo Park, CA—Steven Kahn, the current Deputy Director of the Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology (KIPAC), has been named the next Director of Particle and Particle Astrophysics (PPA) at the Department of Energy's Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC).

David MacFarlane, currently the Assistant Director for Elementary Particle Physics, will take on the role of Deputy Director of Particle and Particle Astrophysics.

"This is clearly a very pressing time for the field and for SLAC, with exciting questions to be answered and real strategy to be developed," said Kahn. "I look forward to working on these challenges with David, while also strengthening the growing overlap with the Laboratory's photon science program in areas including accelerator science, detector R&D and computing."

As Director of Particle and Particle Astrophysics, Kahn will oversee SLAC's B-Factory Program (the PEP-II accelerator and the associated detector, BaBar), the DOE-sponsored work performed at KIPAC, the SLAC-based teams working on the Large Hadron Collider experiment ATLAS and the International Linear Collider effort, advanced accelerator research and non-accelerator particle physics programs.

In addition to serving as Director of PPA, Kahn retains the joint faculty appointment at SLAC and in Stanford's Department of Physics that he has held since coming to Stanford four years ago. Previous to that, Kahn served as chair of the physics department at Columbia University, where he oversaw both astrophysics and particle physics research. He has also served on the Fermilab Physics Advisory Committee for the past four years and was a very influential member of the committee that wrote the High Energy Physics Advisory Panel's Quantum Universe report.

Kahn will step down from his current role at KIPAC to take the new position, but will continue working as Deputy Director of the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope project.

"SLAC is privileged to be able to appoint two such superb scientists as Director and Deputy Director of the SLAC PPA Directorate," said Robin Staffin, Associate Director for High Energy Physics in the DOE's Office of Science. "Both have outstanding reputations in their specialties—Steve Kahn in particle astrophysics and David MacFarlane in particle physics—but in addition, they both have a good knowledge and experience of working in the area where these two fields overlap."

Kahn will replace Persis Drell, who has served as Director of Particle and Particle Astrophysics since 2002, on August 1, 2007. Drell will stay on as Deputy Director of the Laboratory through the end of the year.

"Particle and Particle Astrophysics at SLAC has strong foundations thanks to the exceptional leadership of Persis Drell during the five years she has served as Director of PPA," said SLAC Director Jonathan Dorfan. "Steve Kahn and David MacFarlane step up at the time when the science questions have never been more compelling. Together they comprise an ideal team to lead the Laboratory and its user community in these exciting times."

MacFarlane served as spokesperson for the BaBar collaboration between 2004 and 2006. He joined SLAC faculty in the fall of 2005 from the University of California at San Diego.

"I look forward to working with Steve to help realize the full spectrum of exciting science opportunities before us," said MacFarlane. "SLAC has a uniquely talented scientific and technical staff, who have been the key to past discoveries in accelerator science and particle physics and who will continue to be the foundation for the future program."

by Kelen Tuttle

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