Affectionately called the "quantum cowboy," Marlan Scully rides herd on theoretical and experimental work at the frontiers of physics. He and his colleagues bring to life new knowledge spurring applications of quantum mechanics in optics and computing and spearheading efforts to engineer a quick way to identify biological weapons like anthrax using lasers.  In addition to his appointments at Texas A&M University as Distinguished Professor of Physics, holder of the Hershel E. Burgess Chair in Physics and professor of Chemical and Electrical engineering. Scully also holds a joint appointment as a professor at Princeton University and, in his spare time, is helping to breed cattle that could flourish in harsh climates like Mongolia, and working with his electrical engineer son, Steve, to develop  a radio activated electronic release bolus for livestock.

 
Talk to Scully about his "top gun" physicist status, and he responds with the kind of "aw-shucks modesty" typical of the Western hero. Pressed to talk about himself, all Scully wants to do is praise his research team, which now includes Nobel Laureate Dudley Herschberg, who is jointly professor at Texas A&M and at Harvard.

"Here in the Colleges of Science and Engineering at Texas A&M University, we've assembled a world-class quantum optics group," says Scully. "We've been able to recruit the most wonderful people from all over the world - the United States, Germany, Russia, Pakistan, China - and in turn, our doctoral students join the faculties of top universities like Harvard and become lead industrial scientists at, for example, Intel.  Where once we hoped to snare Ivy League faculty, now our students teach at such institutions."

Scully is so appreciated by his Texas A&M co-workers and colleagues at other institutions that, for his 60th birthday a few years ago, they produced a 600-page book celebrating his scientific achievements. The work is titled Ode to a Quantum Physicist: A Festschrift in Honor of Marlan O. Scully, edited by Wolfgang P. Schleich of the Abteilung fur Quantenphysik at the Universitate Ulm, Ulm, Germany; Herbert Walther of the Max-Planck-Institut fur Quantenoptik at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitat, Munich, Germany; and Willis Lamb of the Optical Sciences Center at the University of Arizona.

Stopping light, shrinking transistors and foiling terrorists

Scully's team's accomplishments cover the fields of quantum optics, quantum computation, teleportation and the slowing down of the speed of light and quantum thermodynamics, including devising a way to stop light, an accomplishment that could help develop super-fast computers, called quantum computers.  And the techniques they have developed in the process can also be used to miniaturize semiconductor components beyond the standard quantum limit and use lasers to identify substances suspected of being biological weapons.

“Shortly after the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the United States, my son Jim, an American Airline’s Captain, came to me with a request for developing a fast way to identify suspicious substances such as the white powder found in the mail of a passenger on one of his planes,” Scully says.  “Ordinary tests require time consuming culturing of suspicious substances in the lab.  But using laser spectroscopy, we can determine in seconds whether a substance is harmless or whether it needs further tests.”

Scully’s technique depends on the presence of a special benzene-like molecule at the center of the anthrax spore.  This structure constitutes up to 17 percent of the weight of each spore and vibrates at a specific frequency when bombarded by two lasers of different wavelengths.

“We can tell almost instantly whether a substance is baby powder, as was the case with the sample found on my son’s flight, or whether it could be anthrax and must be investigated further,” Scully explains.

Scully and his colleague Suhail Zubairy also have discovered methods of using lasers to make transistors much smaller than previously thought possible.  Such research owes much to the team’s early experiments to “corral” light.

"Slowing down light revolutionizes modern nonlinear optics," says Olga Kocharovskaya, another physics professor at Texas A&M. "Utilizing the nonlinear properties of light in a medium is usually not easy because it requires the use of lasers of very high intensity, and such lasers in many cases are not available or destroy the medium. Now by slowing down light, we have another way to realize these nonlinear properties without using very intense beams."

But not all Scully’s work involves lasers and light.

Rebuilding engines in the mind

"Here in College Station, we're not only thinking about physics problems, we're doing cutting-edge quantum engineering research," Scully continues. "We look at problems that span the gamut of quantum physics and engineering, ranging from the age-old question of the duality in matter and light (waves vs. particles) and challenging the conventional interpretation of the uncertainty relation on the one hand to stopping light and designing the components for quantum computation on the other."

As an example of some of Scully’s earlier research, hot exhaust from internal combustion engines could power the lasers of the future, if the Texas physicist has anything to say about it.  In an article published in Physical Review Letters, Scully explained the theory of how a "quantum afterburner" could induce laser action in such waste gases.

"The process would involve the internal quantum states of the gases' working molecules, along with the techniques of cavity quantum electrodynamics," Scully said. "What goes in are normally useless waste gases, and what comes out is coherent laser light, which can be viewed as increased horsepower."

In another article published in “Science” Scully and co-workers show how it is possible to build engines which operate using a new kind of “quantum fuel.” Such an engine would operate beyond the bounds put on ordinary engines but would not violate the laws of thermodynamics. The key point is that quantum thermodynamics, in the hands of Scully et al., allows us to push limits and extend our understanding. Where all this will lead is anybody's guess; but, it's great fun!"

Scully honored by peers

In addition to his other positions, Scully also holds a distinguished research chair with the Texas Engineering Experiment Station and serves as director of the Center for Theoretical Physics and the Institute for Quantum Studies.  He is a member of the prestigious Germany's Max Planck Society.

Scully has been elected to the National Academy of Sciences and to the Academia Europaea, an international association of scientists and scholars, based in London. The Academia Europaea promotes appreciation of European scholarship and research, makes recommendations to national governments and international agencies about science and scholarship in Europe and encourages interdisciplinary and international research in all areas of learning.

Scully has received the Charles H. Townes Award and the Adolph Lomb Medal of the Optical Society of America, the Quantum Electronics Award of IEEE, the Elliott Cresson Medal of the Franklin Institute, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and the Alexander von Humboldt Distinguished Faculty Prize.

And in October, 2005, Scully received the Arthur L. Schawlow Prize in Laser Science from the American Physical Society, Division of Laser Physics.  He was awarded the prize for his “many far reaching contributions to quantum optics and quantum electronics and, in particular, for the quantum theory of lasers, for the theory of free-electron lasers and laser gyros, and for theoretical contributions to optical coherence effects.”

Scully joined the faculty at Texas A&M in 1992 as professor of physics. He earned his undergraduate degree in engineering physics at the University of Wyoming in 1962 and his master's and doctoral degrees in physics at Yale University in 1963 and 1966.  In addition to his work with graduate students, Scully is interested in making physics understandable for everyone, most recently helping his son Rob, a diesel mechanic and Marine sergeant, write a book explaining the history and philosophy of quantum mechanics, entitled The Demon and the Quantum.

"Nobel Prize winner Bill Phillips once said he would like to thank God for giving us such an interesting universe to study," Scully observed. 

“And I in turn would like to thank God for the 'Texas Atomic and Molecular University' which keeps the four 'F's' in focus: Faith, Family, Friends, and Physics,” he quipped.