In Remembrance of Dr. Terry Sheridan

In Remembrance of Dr. Terry Sheridan

By Dr. William Theisen

Hello,

First, I would like to introduce myself – I’m Bill Theisen – I have been a member of the physics department and a colleague of Terry’s for over 15 years andI have been asked to share a few words about Dr. Terry Sheridan.

As Dr. Caragiurecently said, “We have lost a singular individual. Terry was an extremely knowledgeable and creative physicist and certainly one of the best researchers on campus. He was also an invaluable mentor who helped students excel at the highest level.”

People who knew Terry might say that he was quite shy and maybe didn’t get out to meet a lot of the faculty, but he always had positive things to sayabout the people here at ONU. He was such an excellent colleague with a fun and clever sense of humor. As he used to tell the freshmen engineers, ‘A motivated student has the ability to solve an integral without hurting themselves.’

A few words about Terry’s background as a physicist:

• He received his B.A. in physics from Hiram College in 1983, graduating summa cum laude, with honors.
• He earned his Ph.D. in experimental plasma physics from Dartmouth College in 1987.
• Prior to coming to ONU his academic appointments included

• The University of Iowa,
• West Virginia University
• and The Australian National University’s Institute for Advanced Studies.

At the time I interviewed Terry for the position here at ONU,there was a push from the administration to hire faculty who were both strong teachers and had an ability to engage students intheir research. Terry fit this perfectly. He already had over 70 published papers and had solid experience as a visiting professor at several fine institutions.

Terrystarted at ONU in the fall of 2002 and promptly renamed my plasma lab‘the Dusty – ONU – plasma experimenT’ or DONUT for short. He said, “All the best labs have the best names” I kind of looked at him and said, “Donuts?” He said, “MmmDonuts – is there anything they can’t do?” He proceeded to expand and update the lab with a large amount of new equipment that he found on e-bay. He saidthat apparently lots of scientific equipment tends to fall off trucks and ends up for sale on e-bay. This sounded good to me.

Though his work was truly world class, he believed strongly in undergraduate research and immediately had several students working in the lab. I was also able to collaborate with him on several papers and presentations, and felt privileged to do so. Throughout the years Terry and his students presented their research at numerous regional and national conferences and published articles in the top physics journals.

His scientific productivity was remarkable, totaling more than 100 papers published in respected journals such as Physics of Plasmas,Physical Review Letters and Physical Review, the second two being the gold standard in physics. He has been cited more than 2500 times in more than 1500 articles. He had 29 publications from research completed at ONU.And actually for his Sabbatical next year, he was planning on travelling to France where he had beenrecently invited to collaborate with fellow researchers.

I’ll end the same way I started:

We have lost a singular colleague: an extremely knowledgeable and creative physicist, an internationally recognized researcher in plasma physics, an invaluable mentor for students, and an excellent colleague and friend. He will be greatly missed.

Thank you

-Continued -

The lab was used indiscriminately for his research as well as for research with students. Terry welcomed and guided students in his research program with no preconceived notion that relevant research cannot be made while one is an undergraduate student. His undergraduate research with ONU Physics majors resulted in numerous conference presentations and 8 joint publications. To cite only the 2016-2017 faculty–student publications, and we are already looking at 4 articles (2 in Journal of Plasma Physics, one in Journal of Applied Physics and one in Physics of Plasmas).

He was cited more than 2500 times in more than 1500 articles.

Terry’s teaching ability and connection to students in classroom setting is proven by the student evaluations, and some very laudatory comments that students posted. It is no wonder, though: the extensive knowledge that he displayed (not only in physics!) was like a continuous documentary on topics of every kind, much to the enlightenment of students.

I’ll end the same way I started:

We have lost a singular person: an extremely knowledgeable and creative physicist, one of the best researchers on campus, an invaluable mentor for students, and overall, a somewhat eccentric individual who made the life in our department more exciting!

They say that no one is irreplaceable, and we are trying hard to believe this. Unlike Alexandre Dumas’s musketeers, who first were three and then the fourth one joined, we were always the four of us, and we hope to soon be four again.

Or, to put it in a language that might appeal to the musically inclined people and also given Terry’s Australian connection: we sadly lost our legend Bon Scott and we are now looking for our Brian Johnson to rebuild our physics and astronomy quartet; this is the moment when we need all the help we can get.