Millennium Magazine_8th Ed

273 Millennium - A Marquis Who’s Who Magazine SCIENCES, PHARMACEUTICALS AND BIOTECHNOLOGY A native of Germany, Dr. I.-Juliana Christy is a distinguished astrophysicist who has accrued more than 50 years of excellence in her field. After immigrating to Canada at the age of 13, she received a BA in physics in 1963, an MA in astronomy in 1965 and a PhD in astrophysics in 1968 from the University of Toronto. She won a two-year NATO postdoctoral fellowship in 1968, which she held at the University of Göttingen and the Max Planck Institute for Physics and Astrophysics in Munich. In Germany, she learned historical secrets of Werner Heisenberg’s involvement in the German atomic bomb project. At international astrophysical meetings in Europe, Dr. Christy encountered Prof. Robert F. Christy, who was Provost at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech). At that time, all tenured faculty at Caltech were male, but Prof. Christy was sufficiently impressed that he initiated inclusion of women among Caltech’s tenured faculty. In early 1971, Dr. Christy won a Senior von Humboldt Award, continuing her research in Germany for a third year. In late 1971, she relocated to Caltech to take up a postdoctoral position. She obtained a research associate position at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory in 1974, then became a senior research fellow at Caltech in 1976 and faculty associate in 1981. She focused her research efforts on stellar evolution, the future of the sun and earth, and creation of basic elements in stars. Dr. Sackmann Christy was married to the late Dr. Robert F. Christy from 1973 until his passing in 2012. He had been a key member of the Manhattan Project, known for his design of the “Christy Gadget,” the atomic bomb that terminated World War II. When he became Interim President of Caltech for 18 months, Dr. Christy served as Caltech’s First Lady. Dr. Christy authored the book “Achieving the Rare: Robert F. Christy’s Journey in Physics and Beyond” in 2013. Her contributions to astrophysics are recognized in “2,000 Outstanding Scientists of the 21st Century” (International Biographical Centre, Cambridge, England). INGE JULIANA SACKMANN CHRISTY FACULTY ASSOCIATE EMERITUS California Institute of Technology Pasadena, CA