Memorial Tributes Volume 14 (2011) / Chapter Skim
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JOSEPH MILLER
JOSEPH MILLER
Pages 214-223
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From page 215... ...
Sam Yuster was a good principal investigator, but he was an absolute genius at knowing how to teach about life and how to motivate -- and motivated Joe became. His academics improved to practically straight A's for the rest of his stay at UCLA; he wrote papers, he made innovations, and he became a first-rate engineering leader.
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From page 216... ...
Armed with a Ph.D. in the nuclear field, Joe joined Atomics International and worked for eight years on liquid metal reactors, an advanced class of power reactors cooled with liquid alkali metals.
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From page 217... ...
He started out as staff to the chief engineer and in a short time was promoted to assistant chief engineer and eventually took the place of the chief engineer for the Apollo lunar descent engine. Joe was clearly too late to have much influence on the research phase, but his skills as a planner, a manager, and a new, inquisitive voice to question project decisions were invaluable.
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From page 218... ...
The entire Apollo team celebrated, though politicians soon stepped to the forefront. The two-hour television broadcast from the Moon landing was seen by an estimated 500 million people around the world, up to that time the largest single TV audience.
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From page 219... ...
Joe established a structure to assign requirements and to get rapid feedback; he chaired planning meetings; he held frequent working meetings for the solution of specific technical issues; and he reported faithfully problems and accomplishments alike. Following completion of the lunar program, Joe was promoted to laboratory director, with about 300 engineers and scientists with responsibility for propulsion, fluid mechanics, solid state physics, and applications of electro-physics and
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From page 220... ...
Due to the high cost of fuel and the expense of development, the application of chemical lasers was restricted to the military, where the possibility for speed-of-light delivery of very intense energy concentrations led to military interest in high-energy weapons system applications. A laser produces coherent light that can be concentrated and focused to a vastly higher intensity than an incoherent beam.
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From page 221... ...
Still, Joe's team made the fundamental measurements, designed the whole laser system, and balanced and optimized. At this point, it is worthwhile to include a short tutorial on chemical lasers, as authored by Joe, some 15 years ago: "A chemical laser uses its own inherent reaction energy and needs no electrical augmentation.
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From page 222... ...
I also have a relatively broad technical knowledge involving nuclear reactors, combustion, optics and optical phenomena, test and laboratory facilities, and have background in the management of innovation and the development of complex technologies and products." Joe indeed did have the fundamental knowledge. He held six patents and authored 25 technical publications (in addition to numerous classified papers)
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From page 223... ...
He made very significant contributions to national programs and laid the research foundations for commercial applications, and he deserves our admiration. Perhaps it was Professor Yuster who had a major impact on him, but Joe, in turn, had an equal impact on others around him.
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