David Schramm

Current Schramm Fellow John Beacom, who had other job offers, was drawn by Fermilab's world-class cosmology and theoretical

John Beacom

astrophysics group, and by the opportunity to collaborate with experimental astrophysicists, particle theorists and neutrino experimentalists.

"This was perfect for me," Beacom said. "What made it even more exciting was the whole Fermilab environment."

Beacom modestly deflects the notion that he is carrying on Schramm's legacy, but he does use Schramm's old office. When he moved in, Beacom found several of Schramm's old transparencies in a drawer, and three of them now hang framed on the wall. One says in big letters: "BIG PROBLEM: WHY?"

"Let's put it this way," Beacom said. "If David Schramm were still alive, we'd have a lot to talk about."

The application deadline for the second David Schramm Fellowship term expired on December 1. Now the astrophysics group is reviewing applications for the five-year paid research position that Kolb says is meant to attract people who will become leaders in the field.

"We don't have a big problem that our neighbors don't trust us, or don't like us. The people who know us, pretty much like us," says Judith Jackson, spokeswoman for the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Batavia.

But many of its nonparticle physicist neighbors (you know who you are, Mr. and Mrs. Don't Know A Top Quark from a Bottom Quark) haven't made the effort to get acquainted.
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