Richard G. Milner

Professor of Physics
Focused on studying the spin structure of strongly interacting systems.
Research Areas
Nuclear Physics Experiment
(617) 258-5439
Office: 26-411
Lab(s): Hadronic Physics Group (HPG)
Affiliated Center(s): Laboratory for Nuclear Science (LNS)
Assistant: Daniel Holt

Research Interests

QCD structure of proton and nuclei

Biographical Sketch

Richard G. Milner is a professor of physics at MIT and has worked there since 1988. He was born and raised in Mayfield, Cork, Ireland and studied at University College Cork: B.Sc. (Hons.) in Experimental Physics in 1978 and M.Sc. in Theoretical Physics in 1979. He received his Ph.D. in Physics in 1985 from Caltech. His research focuses on understanding nucleon and nuclear structure using the lepton probe, frequently using spin observables and polarized internal gas targets. He has proposed and led experiments at SLAC, IUCF, MIT, DESY, and Jefferson Lab. He has served as director of the MIT-Bates Linear Accelerator Center from 1998 to 2006 and director of MIT’s Laboratory for Nuclear Science from 2006 to 2015. He has served on numerous international advisory committees, was chair of the Division of Nuclear Physics of the American Physical Society (APS) in 2007, and served as chair of the International Spin Physics Committee from 2014 to 2017. He is a fellow of the APS, a recipient of a D.Sc. (honoris causa) from the National University of Ireland in 2010 as well as an award from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, Germany in 2011. He has been awarded the 2020 Tom W. Bonner Prize of the APS.

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In the news
An illustration of the proton with red, blue, and green quarks and lines
In the news

“Visualizing the Proton” through animation and film

An art-science collaboration tests the limits of visual technologies. 

Awards & Honors

  • 2020 // Tom W. Bonner Prize in Nuclear Physics (APS) "for his pioneering work developing and using polarized internal targets in storage rings and for leadership in the study of the structure of the nucleon in a wide range of electronuclear experiments.”
  • 2019 // Mellon Faculty Fellow by MIT’s Center for Art, Science and Technology
  • 2018 // Buechner Special Teaching Award (MIT) "for the efforts put forth to develop the Experimental Techniques course" (co-recipient Prof. Christoph Paus)
  • 2011 // The Humboldt Prize from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, Germany
  • 2010 // D.Sc. degree honoris causa from National University of Ireland, December 2nd 2010 in Dublin
  • 2007 // American Physical Society Fellow "For his leadership in the HERMES/DESY and BLAST/Bates experiments which have advanced our understanding of the spin structure of strongly interacting systems."
  • 1988 // Presidential Young Investigator, National Science Foundation

Key Publications

  • Measurement of the Charge-Averaged Elastic Lepton-Proton Scattering Cross Section by the OLYMPUS Experiment J.C. Bernauer et al. (The OLYMPUS Collaboration) Phys. Rev. Lett. 126, 162501 (2021)

  • Measurement of Møller Scattering at 2.5 MeV C.S. Epstein et al., Phys. Rev. D 102, 012006 (2020)

  • A New Approach To Determine Radiative Capture Reactions at Astrophysical Energies I. Friščić, T.W. Donnelly and R.G. Milner Phys. Rev. C 100, 025804 (2019)

  • Measurement of the Vector and Tensor Asymmetries at Large Missing Momentum in Quasielastic (e,e’p) Electron Scattering from Deuterium A. DeGrush et al., (The BLAST Collaboration) Phys. Rev. Lett. 119, 182501 (2017)