Honors Day 2017
The physics department hosted the annual honors day ceremonies April 24, recognizing a distinguished alumnus, outstanding students, and the teacher of the year. Below is a list of all the honorees.
2017 Distinguished Alumni Honoree & Speaker
1969 PhD Graduate
Dr. Laszlo Adler (left) accepts the Distinguished Alumni Award from Department Head Hanno Weitering.
A native of Hungary, Laszlo Adler earned a master’s degree in physics at Michigan State University, where he began working in the field of ultrasonics. He taught at the General Motors Institute in Flint, Michigan, where he developed a course on ultrasonics and became acquainted with its application to industrial problems. He came to the University of Tennessee in 1966, where he taught fulltime while working toward his doctorate. He earned the PhD in 1969 for his dissertation on Parametric Excitation of Ultrasonic Waves: Linear and Nonlinear Phenomena. He joined the faculty and also began a long and fruitful tenure as a consultant at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. In 1980 he joined the faculty at Ohio State University, where he held chaired professorships in the departments of Welding Engineering and Engineering Mechanics. He also developed OSU’s interdisciplinary graduate program on nondestructive evaluation: the first such program in the United States. In 1993, he won Ohio State’s Distinguished Scholar Award. He also established Adler Consultants to help both federal and private agencies develop methods and systems in nondestructive evaluation. Dr. Adler is co-author of the book Ultrasonic Spectral Analysis for Nondestructive Evaluation and has authored 12 book chapters. He holds four patents and has published more than 200 papers on physical acoustics and its application to nondestructive evaluation and material characterization. The department was pleased to honor Dr. Adler with this year’s Distinguished Alumni Award “for his outstanding contributions to ultrasonics, nondestructive evaluation, and materials characterization.”
See the 2017 Honors Day photo album, and learn more about the names behind our awards.
Outstanding First Year Physics Student: Adam Bryant
Robert Talley Award for Outstanding Undergraduate Research: Brandon Barker
James W. McConnell Award for Academic Excellence: Chima McGruder
Douglas V. Roseberry Award: Louis Varriano
Robert W. Lide Citation: David McCallister
Outstanding Graduate Teaching Assistant Award: Phil Dee
Outstanding Tutor Award: Aaron Kirby
Colloquium Award: Xin Wen
Paul Stelson Fellowships | Beginning Research: Tyler Smith; Professional Promise: Shaozhi Li
Fowler-Marion Outstanding Graduate Student Award: Daniel Odell
Society of Physics Students Teacher of the Year Award: Lucas Platter
Other spring honors for the physics department:
2017 Chancellor's Honors
Extraordinary Academic Achievement: Chima McGruder
Extraordinary Professional Promise: Kevin Bass, Jose Bonilla, Daniel Odell, Brooke Carter, Brandon Cathey, Ghaneshwar Gautam, Chima McGruder, Mae Scott, Cory Thornsberry
Undergraduate Researcher of the Year: Louis Varriano
Torchbearer: Louis Varriano
Research and Creative Achievement: Robert Grzywacz
William Franklin Harris III Undergraduate Research Award: Louis Varriano