Biography:

For 36 years, Dr. John Rumble has been a leader in scientific and technical (S&T) data, including physics, materials, and engineering. For 24 years, he worked for the National Institute of Standards and Technology, serving as Director of the NIST Standard Reference Data Program and Chief of the NIST Measurement Services Division. From 2004 to 2011, Dr. Rumble was Executive VP of Information International Associates, a company in Oak Ridge TN. He is now President of R&R Data Services, in Gaithersburg MD.

Dr. Rumble was among the first to build online, PC, and web-based S&T databases, in physics, materials science, and other fields. In 1982, he began efforts to build and deliver large-scale materials databases, working with industry, professional societies, and government agencies. Rumble also started a number of physics data projects, including the first e-Book of physics data. In 2008, he organized the first U.S. workshop on nanomaterials data.

Dr. Rumble has considerable industrial physics and materials science experience. In 1979-1980, he worked at the IAEA in Vienna Austria. During his time at NIST, he worked with many industry organizations and professional societies to develop industry-related data programs in materials science and engineering, as well as standards for industrial data.

Dr. Rumble has written three books and many articles on S&T data. He has published papers on atomic and molecular physics. Rumble received a B.A. in Chemistry from Cornell University, a M.A. in Chemistry from the City University of New York, and a Ph.D. in Chemical Physics from Indiana University. He spent four years at the JILA in Boulder CO and was a postdoctoral fellow at the Quantum Chemistry Institute in Uppsala, Sweden.

Dr. Rumble has been named Fellow of several professional societies including the IUPAC, AAAS, ASTM International, and ASM International, as well as a Foreign Member of the Russian Academy of Metrology. In 1998-2002, Rumble was President of CODATA, the ICSU Committee on Data for Science and Technology, which oversees the approval of the CODATA Set of Fundamental Constants. He was awarded the CODATA 2006 Prize for achievements in S&T data.

Statement:

The majority of my professional career has been working in areas directly related to the needs of industry, especially physics, materials science, and engineering. Today, the importance of industrial and applied physics cannot be overemphasized. With the development of nanoscale technologies and materials, the approach of the limits of Moore’s law, and the growing realization that physics research is critical to areas as diverse as climate change, biomedical engineering, energy, and advanced manufacturing, APS and FIAP must do everything possible to support physics, especially in industry. I have successfully worked with a broad set of industry groups, professional societies, and research institutions to build multi-disciplinary programs involving many areas of applied physics, including materials science, scientific and technical data for industry, and fundamental A&M data for advanced energy technologies. I will bring my experience as an industry executive, my knowledge of science in general and physics in particular, and my skills as a facilitator to FIAP to enhance and grow the use of physics as a vital part of our industrial future.