Professor Eugene Golowich passes away
We regret to announce that Prof. Eugene Golowich, a beloved faculty member in our Department, died in December 2024 after a career of great accomplishment both in the classroom and as a high-energy theorist.
Prof. Golowich was an exceptional teacher. Anyone who has been in his classes will remember his artistic multi-colored blackboard notes which concisely summarized his well-prepared lectures. His dry wit also permeated his classroom. He developed a graduate course on Group Theory at a time where this was novel in physics. He was the first recipient of the College of Natural Sciences’ Outstanding Teacher Award in 1993.
In his research activities, Prof. Golowich described himself as a “calculator”, happy to uncover the connections between theoretical models and experiment. He was a major contributor to the development of the quark structure of matter, to the phenomenology of the weak interactions and to the physics of heavy quarks. He was a co-author to a textbook describing our present best fundamental theory – “Dynamics of the Standard Model “ with John Donoghue and Barry Holstein, now available in open access .
Prof. Golowich was born July 21, 1939 in Mt. Vernon NY. His B.S. in physics from Rensselaer Poly Technic Institute (1961) was followed by a Ph. D from Cornell (1965) working with Peter Caruthers. After a postdoctoral position at Carnegie Mellon University (1965-67) he accepted a faculty position at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, where he was one of the founders of a blossoming particle theory group.
Prof. Golowich is survived by his wife Joan, his children Steven and Laura and their families. His Departmental colleagues will miss his thoughtful presence and his many contributions to UMass.