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Steven Chu Biography

Steven Chu (Chinese: 朱棣文; pinyin: Zhū Dìwén, born February 28, 1948) is an American physicist and a former government official. He is known for his research at Bell Labs and Stanford University regarding the cooling and trapping of atoms with laser light, for which he won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1997, along with his scientific colleagues Claude Cohen-Tannoudji and William Daniel Phillips.

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Steven Chu Quotes

While we cannot accurately predict the course of climate change in the coming decades, the risks we run if we don't change our course are enormous. Prudent risk management does not equate uncertainty with inaction.

Climate, Inaction, Management, Risk, Running

Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe.

Energy, Europe, Gasoline, Levels

Suppose you had a small electrical fire and. . . a structural engineer [looked] at your home's wiring [and] reports that the wiring is "shot" and there is a 50% chance that your house would burn down in the next few years unless you replace all the wiring. The job will cost $20,000. . . so you get an independent assessment. The next engineer agrees with the first warning. You can either continue to shop for additional evaluations until you find the one engineer in 1,000 that is willing to give you the answer you want, "Your family is not in danger" or you can change the wiring.

1000, Answer, Engineer, Home, Independent, Jobs

For the better part of my last semester at Garden City High, I constructed a physical pendulum and used it to make a "precision" measurement of gravity. The years of experience building things taught me skills that were directly applicable to the construction of the pendulum. Twenty-five years later, I was to develop a refined version of this measurement using laser-cooled atoms in an atomic fountain interferometer.

Construction, Education, Garden, Precision, Science, Used

My physics teacher, Thomas Miner was particularly gifted. To this day, I remember how he introduced the subject of physics. He told us we were going to learn how to deal with very simple questions such as how a body falls due to the acceleration of gravity.

Deal, Fall, Gifted, Remember, Simple, Teacher

Education in my family was not merely emphasized, it was our raison d'etre.

Education, Emphasized, Merely, My Family, Raison, Raison D'Etre

So imagine a world 6 degrees warmer. It's not going to recognize geographical boundaries. It's not going to recognize anything. So agriculture regions today will be wiped out.

Agriculture, Degrees, Imagine, World

Occasionally, I would focus on a particular school project and become obsessed with, what seemed to my mother, to be trivial details instead of apportioning the time I spent on school work in a more efficient way.

Focus, Mother, Occasionally, School, Seemed

By the fourth grade, I graduated to an erector set and spent many happy hours constructing devices of unknown purpose where the main design criterion was to maximize the number of moving parts and overall size.

Design, Happy, Maximize, Moving, Numbers, Purpose

Science is really about describing the way the universe works in one aspect or another in all branches of science-how a life-form works, how this works, how that works. . . . You have to have a natural curiosity for that.

Aspect, Branches, Curiosity, Science, Universe, Works

As the saying goes, the Stone Age did not end because we ran out of stones; we transitioned to better solutions. The same opportunity lies before us with energy efficiency and clean energy.

Age, Lying, Opportunity, Science, Transitioned

Pick the right sized pot, don't pick a pot five times bigger, twice as big.

Bigger, Bigs, Five, Pick, Pot, Twice

Education in my family was not merely emphasized, it was our raison d'être. Virtually all of our aunts and uncles had Ph. D. s in science or engineering, and it was taken for granted that the next generation of Chu's were to follow the family tradition. When the dust had settled, my two brothers and four cousins collected three MDs, four Ph. D. s and a law degree. I could manage only a single advanced degree.

Brother, Cousin, Emphasized, Law, Mds, Uncles

What the American family does not want is to pay an increasing fraction of their budget, their precious dollars, for energy costs.

Energy, Doe, Dollars, American, Budget, Precious

Switching to light-coloured roofs and roadways would have the equivalent effect on greenhouse gas emissions to taking one billion cars off the road for eleven years.

Light, Years, Car, Switching, Equivalent, Billion

I called my mother up when they announced the Nobel Prize, waiting until 7 in the morning. She said, "That's nice - and when are you going to see me next?"

Announced, Morning, Mother, Nice, Said, Waiting

Sustainable energy is the equivalent of the U. S. moon shot.

Energy, Equivalent, Moon, Shot, Sustainable Energy

I also developed an interest in sports, and played in informal games at a nearby school yard where the neighborhood children met to play touch football, baseball, basketball and occasionally, ice hockey.

Basketball, Football, Games, Inspirational, Neighborhood, Sports

Let me state what the official IPCC prediction is: Sea levels could go up as much as three-quarters of a meter in this century, but there is a reasonable probability it could be much higher than that.

Century, Let, Levels, Sea, Three

If other countries don't impose a cost on carbon, then we will be at a disadvantage. . . we would look at considering perhaps duties that would offset that cost.

Business, Carbon, Cost, Country, Impose, Looks

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