David J. Morrissey

University Distinguished Professors Facility for Rare Isotope Beams College of Natural Science

• University Distinguished Professor

• Chemistry
• National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory

Bio

David J. Morrissey, professor of chemistry, is a prominent leader in the area of nuclear chemistry research that centers on the production and use of the most exotic, short-lived nuclei and, in turn, this knowledge is applied to produce beams of exotic radioactive ions. He was part of a team of scientists at the MSU National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory (NSCL) that first developed the instruments to provide beams of exotic nuclei for research and then, based on that leadership, helped to successfully land the project to design and build the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams (FRIB) at MSU. Morrissey holds joint appointments in the Department of Chemistry, NSCL and FRIB. He served as associate director for nuclear science at the NSCL from 1995-1999 and 2009-2012, and as associate director for operations since 2015.

Morrissey received a B.S. with distinction in chemistry from the Pennsylvania State University, his Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley, and was a postdoctoral fellow at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory. He was also a visiting scientist at Gesellshaft für Schwerionenforschung, Darmstadt, West Germany, and has an ongoing relationship with the RIKEN Laboratory in Tokyo.

Throughout his career, Morrissey has served as chair of a number of international conferences on nuclear science, and as chair of the American Chemical Society (ACS) Division of Nuclear Chemistry and Technology. His honors include the 2011 Glenn T. Seaborg Award for Nuclear Chemistry given by the ACS Division of Nuclear Chemistry and Technology.