marlan o scully distinguished professor of physics at texas a&m university was honored tuesday with a reception celebrating his recent election to the national academy of sciences and was praised by a host of top university officials including president ray bowen and executive vice president and provost ronald g douglas the quantum cowboy as his friends and colleagues affectionately refer to him holds the hershel e burgess chair in physics and is a professor in the department of electrical engineering scully also holds a distinguished research chair with the texas engineering experiment station and serves as director of the center for theoretical physics as well as the newly formed institute for quantum studies both within the college of science the reception was held at the clayton w williams jr alumni center and was co-sponsored by the college of science and the dwight look college of engineering texas a&m faculty and administration officials were present to recognize scullys career accomplishments this is a great day for science at texas a&m said john p fackler jr distinguished professor of chemistry it is truly a delight to know that one of our faculty members has the honor of being part of the academy scullys recent accomplishments are in the fields of quantum optics quantum computation teleportation and the slowing down of the speed of light [scully] and his team have made many ‘firsts and had an incredible impact in physics and other sciences said richard e ewing vice president for research douglas said the university will need outstanding faculty members who are good at what they do and are able to communicate what they have learned and discovered to people if the university wants to achieve vision 2020 texas a&ms long-range program to be recognized on a consensus basis as one of the 10 best public universities in the nation by 2020 he praised scully as the embodiment of such outstanding faculty members many of the officials present at the reception recognized scullys enthusiasm in communicating his research activities not only can he make discoveries and insights said douglas but he is also able to communicate his enthusiasm in an infectious way and make clear the importance of his work scullys enthusiasm and communication abilities were recently illustrated when he discussed the future activities of the recently approved institute of quantum studies before the texas a&m university system board of regents he managed to present the activities in a very effective way said bowen within a few minutes all the regents were very impressed and were committed to make the institute the success that [scully] anticipated f albert cotton distinguished professor of chemistry a long-time friend said he has been enjoying scullys optimism and enthusiasm he has been like a fresh breeze flowing through this place cotton said he is such a creative and upbeat sort of person scully is also known by his colleagues to be a team leader while being unselfish he is a self-sacrificial person said roland haden vice chancellor for engineering he is the first to acknowledge his team he wants the young faculty members and other faculty members to get attention scully said he is proud the texas a&m college of engineering has been recently ranked 11th nationwide texas a&m is first last and always an engineering school right he said with a tongue in cheek scully thanked many of his colleagues for providing an excellent research environment referring to a friend of his who said: i would like to thank god for giving us such an interesting universe to study scully said: i would like to thank god for ‘texas atomic and molecular university which keeps the four ‘f in focus: family friends freedom and physics contact: patrice pages (979) 845-4618 or patrice-pages@tamuedu aggiedaily office of university relations texas a&m university (979) 845-4641