In Memoria

Dr. Harry Louis Salvo Jr. passed away on Sunday, February 7th, 2021 from pancreatic and liver cancer. Harry was born on March 26, 1947, in Racine, Wisconsin, and is survived by his wife of 53 years, Elizabeth Salvo, two daughters, Erika and Kara Salvo, and 2 Grandsons Desmond and Donovan. He received a B.S. degree in Applied Mathematics and Physics from the University of Wisconsin in 1969. He attended graduate school at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee where he received the MS and Ph.D. degrees in physics in 1974 and 1979, respectively. Harry started his career at Westinghouse in Baltimore Maryland, now Northrop Grumman, retiring at the age of 65 after 34 years of service. Upon retiring Harry could be found sitting in his chair or down in “mission control” working on his computer. For 10 plus years he volunteered as the equipment manager for the Severna Park High School Marching Band taking great pride in their field shows and parades. He received the Marguerritte Mills volunteer of the year award from the Severna Park Voice in 2006 for his work with the marching band. Harry enjoyed vacationing with his family in Hawaii, Deep Creek Lake, and North Carolina especially if there was a pool. Harry was happiest when spending time with his wife Liz, watching the 6 o’clock news, keeping his daughters safe and in line, or playing with his grandchildren. Harry’s passion for Science and love for his family will live on through Liz, Erika, Kara, Desmond, and Donovan.

Harry worked and published in the broad area of microwave acoustics, contributing to the areas of thin film bulk acoustic devices, surface acoustic wave devices, superconducting devices, GaAs MMIC, and signal processing and frequency control applications. Harry was very active in service to the IEEE UFFC for many years and in many ways. Harry was President of the IEEE Ultrasonics, Ferroelectrics, and Frequency Control Society and a member of the IEEE Technical Activities Board Products Council in 1994 and 1995. He was Society Vice-president from 1991 to 1993 and the Secretary-Treasurer of the UFFC-S Administrative Committee from 1987 to 1991. He was a member of the Ultrasonics Symposium Technical Program Committee and a past President of the Baltimore, Washington, and Northern Virginia Chapter of the UFFC-S. He was involved with the local arrangements for the 1974 Ultrasonics Symposium held in Milwaukee and was Finance Chair for the 1984 Ultrasonics Symposium in Atlanta. In addition to his position as Technical Chair of the 1990 Ultrasonics Symposium in Honolulu, he was the General Chair of the 1993 Ultrasonics Symposium held in Baltimore, MD. He was a Senior Member of the IEEE and a member of the American Physical Society.

Meitzler, Allen Henry, Ph.D. 12/16/1928 – 3/21/2020 Ann Arbor Dr. Allen Henry Meitzler, a retired applied physicist with the Ford Motor Company’s Systems Research Lab and former adjunct professor on the Dearborn campus of the University of Michigan, passed away peacefully Saturday, March 21, at his family residence in Ann Arbor after a brief illness. He was 91 and lived in Ann Arbor with his family since 1973. Allen was born December 16, 1928, to parents Herbert Henry Meitzler and Estella Irene Wagner Meitzler in Allentown, PA. He obtained his B.S. in Physics in 1951 from Muhlenberg College, Allentown, PA, where he was awarded a competitive scholarship for his entire undergraduate career. In June of 1953, he married Joan Catherine Egan in Allentown, PA. He then obtained both his Master’s in Physics (1953) and his Ph.D. in Physics (1955) from Lehigh University, Bethlehem, PA. Very soon after graduating with his doctorate and prior to living in Ann Arbor, Allen joined the Solid State Device Development Laboratory of Bell Laboratories (“Bell Labs”) and worked in their Whippany and Murray Hill, NJ, offices focusing on ultrasonic delay lines, piezoelectric devices, and optical memory and display devices (including the “picture phone”). In late 1972, Allen joined the Ford Motor Company, working as a project leader research scientist/engineer in the Electric Systems Department, Systems Research Laboratory at Ford’s Dearborn complex. And in a few months his family joined him in Ann Arbor. Allen’s work with Ford encompassed development of temperature-controlled sensors, sensor materials, catalytic converters and emission control systems, A/F sensors, and applications of digital microcomputers for engine controls. He later moved to the Advanced Components and Energy Systems Department, Long Range and Systems Research Laboratory of Ford where he explored fiber optic applications to process onboard vehicle data. Throughout his working life, Allen produced multiple journal articles, technical papers, and earned numerous U.S. patents. Allen also was an adjunct professor at the University of Michigan-Dearborn campus from September 1979 until 2011, teaching classes on solid state electronics and electronics engineering in the Department of Electrical Engineering. Allen was a member and officer of several professional societies, including the IEEE (Institute for Electrical and Electronic Engineers) Group on Sonics and Ultra-sonics, where he served in a number of capacities: as secretary/treasurer, then vice-chairman and chairman and finally on its Administration Committee. He was a member of the American Physical Society, the Acoustical Society of America, the Society of Automotive Engineers, and the American Ceramic Society. Allen took flying lessons in his earlier years, was a licensed amateur radio operator and had a talent for drawing and illustration. In addition, he enjoyed playing tennis and golfing and developed an interest in playing the banjo. Allen is survived by his three sons: Thomas and his wife Carmelita of Troy and two granddaughters, Melanie of Ft. Worth, TX, and Angeline of New York City; Peter, also of New York City; and David, residing in Ann Arbor. Allen’s wife, Joan, and brothers, Richard of Kennett Square, PA, and Herbert of Bethlehem, PA, preceded him in death. A memorial service will be held in Ann Arbor in the summertime. Allen was cremated at his direction and will be laid to rest in Forest Hills Cemetery.

Prof. Richard M. White, age 90, passed away this week from complications after a fall. Born in Colorado and educated at Harvard, White joined the EECS department in 1962 after a stint doing research at General Electric. He was a prolific researcher, publisher and inventor, who authored or co‐authored more than 90 research papers and two books. His research on micro‐sensors and actuators making use of Surface Acoustic Wave (SAW) effects, earned him the UFFC Rayleigh Ultrasonics Award in 2003. He founded the Berkeley Sensor and Actuator Center (BSAC) with Richard Muller in 1986, which led the creation of the field of Micro-Electromechanical Systems (MEMS), one of the key innovations pioneered in the EECS department. BSAC currently hosts 12 faculty and more than 100 graduate students. White and Muller earned the James Clerk Maxwell Award for their contributions to MEMS in 2013. Full of energy and ideas, White was also a passionate instructor whose forte was introducing students to electronics (he created and taught the introductory course EE 1 for many years). He was also one of the founders of the Graduate Group in Science and Mathematics Education (SESAME), which was later absorbed into the School of Education. Just before his death, White was actively engaged in the creation of a new sensor to detect COVID-19. He leaves behind two sons, Rollie and Brendan.

Born May 2nd 1938 in Villars-Saint-Georges, a small village in the region of Franche-Comté (France), Raymond Besson deceased April 15th 2020. From a modest rural origin, he began his professional life as high school teacher of Physics in the city of Dole. Then, after a sabbatical period in Ecole Normale Supérieure de Paris, he entered a university carrier that settled him as Professor at Ecole Nationale Supérieure de Mécanique et des Microtechniques (ENSMM) of Besançon from 1974 to 2006. Thereafter he took the charge of a French- Russian center in University of Franche-Comté. In the earlier stage of his scientific carrier, he worked on the measurement of non-linear piezoelectric constants and became “docteur ès Sciences Physiques” in 1970. He was the Director of the Laboratory of Chronometry, Electronics and Piezoelectricity of ENSMM from 1974 to 2002.
Raymond had a strong personality. Guided by his intuition and an acute sense of social relationships, he firmly pushed his ideas toward the ground of reality. During the 70’s he developed high performances electrodeless quartz resonators, so-called BVA, that gave him a solid international recognition by out- breaking the former limit of 10-13 short-term stability of piezoelectric resonators. Among many awards including the Silver Medal of C.N.R.S (1980), he obtained in 1992 the Cady Award “for fundamental contributions to both quartz resonator fabrication technology and understanding of nonlinear effects leading to devices of superior performance”. He authored or co-authored 123 scientific papers and filed 16 patents. Having invited many prominent researchers in his laboratory, he was and still is largely recognized as a pioneer of international scientific cooperation between Time and Frequency scientists. He co-founded the European Frequency and Time Forum in 1987, with late Jean-Jacques Gagnepain, Marcel Ecabert and Bernie Schlueter, and he organized and chaired with Don Sullivan from NIST the first Joint Meeting of the European Frequency and Time Forum and The International Frequency Control Symposium held in Besançon in 1999.
Raymond Besson was President of the French Society of Microtechniques and Chronometry from 1992 to 2002 and initiated many actions to federate the national T&F community, anticipating the creation of the First-TF national network. He always showed a strong commitment to indulge the laboratories into issuing new products and services that can benefit to the mundane society. He applied this objective to himself since he led the BVA resonators up to the stage of industry production and 10 of his patents have been used in industry. His numerous actions in the field of Academy-Industry relationship were remarked and supported by the French authorities who distinguished him as an Officer of the Legion of Honor and of the National Order of Merit. Raymond Besson was a dynamic and unyielding person. Being known throughout the scientific community for his outspokenness, and respected for that, he was deeply convinced of the importance of promoting people by their merit. At the same time, he gave their first opportunity to many young scientists and let them follow their way in complete freedom. In his later times he took much interest in astronomy and started to commit himself to the study of the influence of quantum effects on human brain and behavior. Unfortunately, his sudden death from a heart problem will deprive us from his conclusions in this new field. The T&F community will miss him a lot. Let us express our supporting thoughts and condolences to his wife Colette and his two children Helen and François and their families. Additional information about Raymond Besson’s life can be found at https://ethw.org/First-Hand:Raymond_Besson.

Charles was a visionary, a fearless leader, and a force to be reckoned with. He liked straightforward talking and getting things done. He founded the Department of Biomedical Engineering at the University of Michigan in 1996, which now has top 10 undergraduate and graduate BME programs in the US. Beyond all his academic achievements, Charles was born in Tampa Florida, and raised in Miami Florida. He had a deep love of hiking and camping in the mountains, and his ashes will be distributed in Wind River Mountains in Wyoming, which was his favorite camping destination. Above all, Charles was a beloved husband, father, and grandfather. He is survived by his wife, Li, three sons, Kent, James, and Robert, and grandchildren Travis, Jenna. He will be dearly missed by many people as a creative researcher, a caring mentor, a fearless leader, and a beloved family member. A fellowship for PhD students at the Department of Biomedical Engineering at the University of Michigan in memory of Prof. Cain has been set up. If you would like to contribute, you can donate to the fellowship fund via the link below: https://donate.umich.edu/POlbg. Professor Charles Cain passed away on March 27, 2020, at the age of 77, after a three year fight with prostate cancer.

Doctor Alain Coron, CNRS Research Engineer at the Laboratory of Biomedical Imaging in Paris actively contributed to innovations in biomedical signal and image analysis with particular emphasis on quantitative and statistical signal analysis and machine learning techniques providing better evaluation of cancerous lymph nodes and solid tumors with ultrasound. He also contributed techniques to processing high-frequency ultrasound data and analysis of dynamic contrast-enhaned ultrasound and digitized histology data. Alain passed away at the age of 48 on Thursday the 21st of May 2020, at the Hospital Jean Jaures in Paris France after a 16-month personal battle with cancer. Alain was born in Saint-Etienne, France, in 1971. He received an Engineering degree from the Electronics and Information Department at the Institut de Chimie et Physique Industrielles, Lyon, France, in 1994, and a Ph.D. degree in signal processing from the Institut National Polytechnique de Grenoble, Grenoble, France, in 1998. From 1998 to 2001, he was a Post-Doctoral Fellow with the Universit Catholique de Louvain, Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium, and with the Technische Universiteit Delft, The Netherlands. He was involved in magnetic resonance spectroscopy and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) with time frequency and wavelet transforms and sparse sampling of 3-D MRI. Alain Coron joined the Parametric Imaging Laboratory (one of the labs at the origin of the current Laboratory of Biomedical Imaging, LIB) in Paris in November 2001 just after his recruitment in the CNRS. Alain was on the team “Imaging and Targeted Therapy Development” but he interacted transversally with many of the researchers and students in the laboratory working on signal analysis. Alain’s methodical approach to complex problems, mathematical and data analysis skills and dedication to address clinical needs were widely recognized and sought after for the development of projects both within the laboratory and within national and international collaborations. From 2011 to 2016, he was the principal French scientific investigator for a project led by Drs. Feleppa and Mamou at the Lizzi Center in New York to develop advanced ultrasonic evaluation of sentinel lymph nodes. The project united researchers in France, the USA and Japan with funding from a prestigious RO1 American National Institutes of Health research grant project. In 2013, Alain was awarded the Invitation Fellowship Programs for Research in Japan from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS), an independent institution that advances science in all fields including the natural and social sciences. This prestigious fellowship program provides opportunities for highly qualified foreign researchers to interact closely with leading research groups in Japanese universities and other Japanese institutions, thereby permitting the fellow to advance his or her research while stimulating Japanese scientists, particularly young Japanese researchers. The dialog and collaborations fostered by the fellowship are also intended to advance scientific research in the fellow’s home country. Alain was one of only 300 researchers worldwide selected for the 2012-2013 fellowship. Through the Invitation Fellowship Programs for Research in Japan, Dr. Coron visited Japan twice to pursue studies with Prof. Tadashi Yamaguchi at the host institution, the Chiba University Center for Frontier Medical Engineering during the fall 2013 and winter 2014. While there, Dr. Coron interacted with Japanese investigators at all levels, from students to senior researchers and faculty and he was able to strengthen existing collaborative ties with Prof. Yamaguchi to make significant contributions to lymph-node studies. Alain was a long time member of IEEE UFFC and IEEE SPS. He was an associate editor for the international journal Ultrasonics. He was scientific advisor for many master’s level students and PhD students who benefited greatly from his expertise and exacting teaching. His work led to invited presentations at international conferences (most recently at the Microbubble Conference in Leeds, UK and the American Acoustical Society Conference in San Diego in 2019) and 46 peer reviewed research articles. His work was exceptional in terms of methodology and scientific rigor. He produced scientific work of wide-spread interest and trained students with skills that put them at the fore-front of their field. Originally an expert in quantitative signal and image processing methods, his research greatly benefitted from his strong understanding of ultrasound biophysics and its openness to new concepts and ideas. We are fortunate to have been able to interact with a multitalented researcher like Alain. Beyond his significant professional achievements, Alain was also a valued friend who maintained strong ties with students and collaborators both within and outside of the LIB. His curiosity extended far beyond science and discussions with him were always lively and informative. He shared his culture and interest in numerous areas like cooking, sailing, music and politics. Alain maintained a positive attitude even during challenging situations. He was a positive force in the field and in our lives and Alain will be dearly missed.

The international Ferroelectrics community lost one of its most outstanding members with the passing of Professor Jim Scott on 6 April 2020. Jim served as a faculty member of five prestigious universities and received many international awards. His numerous publications have received more than 50,000 citations. James F. Scott was born in New Jersey, USA, and educated at Harvard (B. A., physics 1963) and Ohio State University (Ph.D., physics 1966). After six years in the Quantum Electronics Research Department at Bell Labs he was appointed professor of physics at Univ. Colorado (Boulder), where he also served as Assistant Vice Chancellor for Research. He was Dean of Science and Professor of Physics for eight years in Australia (UNSW, Sydney, and RMIT, Melbourne), Professor of Ferroics in the Physics Department at Cambridge University, and since 2015 Professor of Chemistry and Physics at Univ. St. Andrews. His paper “Ferroelectric Memories” in Science (1989) is probably the most cited paper in electronic ceramics with 4000+ citations, and his textbook of the same title has been translated into Japanese and Chinese. He was elected a Fellow of the APS in 1974, and in 1997 won a Humboldt Prize and appointment as the SONY Corp. Chair of Science (Yokohama). He was awarded a Monkasho Prize in 2001 and in 2008 was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) and recipient of the MRS Medal (Materials Research Society). In 2011 he was elected to the Slovenian Academy of Sciences where earlier he had won the Jozef Stefan Gold Medal. In 2014 he won the Thomson-Reuters Citation Laureate prize, which describes itself as a predictor of Nobel Prizes in Physics, and in 2016 received the UNESCO medal for Contributions to Nanoscience and Nanotechnology. His work has been cited 50,000 times in scientific journals, with eight papers each cited more than 1,000 times and a Hirsch h-index of 100. Additional information about Jim Scott’s life can be found at https://ethw.org/Oral-History:James_F._Scott

Ronald (Ron) Beard, 76, passed away July 20, 2020. He is survived by his wife of 54 years, Carol Ann Beard; his son, Orson Beard (fiancé Melissa); grandchildren, Zachary, Kyle and Elizabeth; and his half-brother, Terry. He is preceded in death by his son, Gregory. Ronald Beard was a physicist at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL). He held undergraduate degrees in Chemical Engineering and Physics and a graduate degree from George Washington University. He began his professional career as an officer in the U.S. Navy in 1968. He retired from full-time government service in 2015, but continued to work part-time at NRL until the time of his death. Mr. Beard’s most notable contribution was as a pioneer in the design and development of technologies for the Global Positioning System (GPS), an essential and ubiquitous capability used all over the world. He continued supporting the operation of GPS and the development of improvements to it. His work also included the expansion of the basic capabilities of GPS into precise frequency and time of day distribution for communications, business, and scientific research. As a young naval officer, Ron was the Project Officer for Navigation Satellites in the Naval Air Systems Command’s Astronautics Division and the TIMATION program, a forerunner to GPS. In 1971 he joined the NRL and their early GPS developments (1971-1979) as the project scientist in the NRL’s GPS Program Office which developed Navigation Technology Satellites One and Two and operated the first atomic clocks in space. In succeeding years, he was the Program Manager of the NRL NAVSTAR GPS Clock Development Program that developed alternative sources of space qualified atomic clocks for the GPS program. One of the primary and most critical contributions of NRL to the GPS program were the development of technologies for enabling space qualified atomic clocks. Those developments began in the early days of GPS and continued under Mr. Beard’s leadership when he became the head of the Space Applications Branch in 1984. Under his leadership that technology came to fruition in the Rubidium technology used in the operational GPS satellites of today. Ron was also instrumental in the development of NRL’s unique capability to test these units under operationally space–like conditions, a capability still used today to test and validate GPS space clocks. Mr. Beard has participated in numerous technical groups including the Air Force Scientific Advisory Board Study Group into Global Air Navigation, Navy representative on Project Reliance Frequency Control Panel, Head of the DoD PNT Focus Team for Space Technology. He has authored or co-authored over 50 technical papers. He was an organizer of the Joint Navigation Conference (JNC) as part of the Institute of Navigation (ION), and served as a Government Liaison to the ION’s Military Division. He was a Fellow of the Institute of Navigation and an ION member for over 30 years. He was also a member of the annual Precise Time and Time Interval (PTTI) Executive Committee, where he served in several executive positions and received the Distinguished PTTI Service Award in 2012. He was a member of the American Geophysical Union and a Senior Member of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. Mr. Beard has participated in or chaired numerous committees dealing with Precise Time and Frequency that have determined the course of systems and technology development both nationally and internationally. He has been the International chairman of the ITU-R working party on Precise Time and Frequency Services since 2005 that determines recommendations to the international community on the generation, dissemination and evaluation of precise time and frequency systems. As the chairman he has participated not only in ITU-R workshops, seminars and working groups but also has represented the ITU and the U.S. in international committees that determine the international time scale and dissemination services.

Siegfried Bauer, an internationally renowned, very creative applied physicist, who also was a prolific materials scientist and engineer, died on 30 December 2018 in Linz, Austria, after a one-year battle with cancer. He was full professor of soft-matter physics at the Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria, and a scientific leader and innovator across the fields, but mainly in the areas of electro-active materials (including electrets) and of stretchable and imperceptible electronics. Siegfried Bauer was born on 15 May 1961 in the small village of Berghausen (Pfinztal) near Karlsruhe. He was the youngest son of a locksmith and a seamstress. His parents were also part-time farmers who owned a small plot of land including a vineyard. In the rural environment of his home village, he quickly develops a very open mind, curiosity about almost everything around him and a deep love of nature. During a long illness in his youth when he had to stay in a hospital bed for several months, he intensely studies mathematics and physics textbooks and subsequently becomes an excellent student. He was fortunate to find deep inspiration and support in his physics teacher, who further motivates him so that he decides to study physics at the University of Karlsruhe (now Karlsruhe Institute of Technology or KIT) from 1980 until 1986. At his university, Siegfried quickly discovers some of the strange features of a traditional research and teaching institution and develops a critical attitude and a unique sense of humor about the academic establishment and its rituals. At the same time, however, he meets inspiring teachers and mentors who selflessly support and guide one of their most gifted students. Wolfgang Ruppel, full professor of applied physics, accepts him as Ph.D. student and encourages him to pursue his own research direction and to start working on ferroelectric polymers, which were at that time still quite often seen as an oddity or even considered “dirty physics” by the solid- state physics community. Siegfried Bauer kept very fond memories of Wolfgang Ruppel, recently stating he would still “go through thick and thin any day with his Ph.D. advisor”. In 1990, Siegfried Bauer successfully defends his Ph.D. thesis on ferroelectric polymers with the rare grade summa cum laude. He continues to work as post- doctoral scientist at his alma mater, but also starts to teach at the Fachhochschule Karlsruhe and takes up research projects at the universities of Karlsruhe, Marburg and Stuttgart in Southern Germany. His expertise in research and teaching grows quickly, and his seminal work leads to several publications. At this time, he also meets his future wife Simona Gogonea who arrives on a German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) scholarship from Bucharest, Romania. Siegfried and Simona marry soon (in 1991) and become very close companions in life and science. In 1992, he joins the Heinrich Hertz Institute for Telecommunications (HHI) in Berlin- Charlottenburg as scientist and project manager. Within his team, he initiates and develops several new experimental techniques and achieves a large range of remarkable results that yield seminal publications mainly in the area of nonlinear optics and photonics with electrooptical polymers. For some of his excellent papers, Siegfried Bauer receives the Prize of the Information Technology Society (ITG) within the German VDE and the Kurt Ueberreiter Award of the Berlin-Brandenburg Society for Polymer Research (BVP), both in 1994. International collaborations take him to the École Polytechnique in Montréal, Québec, Canada (twice), to the University of Arizona in Tucson and to the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in Gaithersburg, Maryland, and lead to several joint publications. When his mentor and life-long friend Reimund Gerhard moves to the University of Potsdam at the end of 1994, Siegfried Bauer becomes his successor as team leader at the HHI. Later Siegfried follows him to the University of Potsdam in order to prepare for his habilitation, and Simona Bauer-Gogonea who in 1995 received her Ph.D. from the Technical University (TU) of Berlin takes over as team leader. Dr. Bauer’s very productive and successful years in Berlin and Potsdam culminate in his habilitation on “Poled polymers for applications in sensorics and photonics” which he defends in 1996 at the University of Potsdam. In 1997, he receives the prestigious Karl Scheel Award of the Physikalische Gesellschaft zu Berlin (PGzB) within the German Physical Society (DPG). After his appointment as lecturer (Privat-Dozent) at the University of Potsdam, he receives offers from a number of universities and accepts a position as Associate Professor at the Johannes Kepler University (JKU) in Linz, Austria, where he starts in October 1997. In 2002, Siegfried Bauer is appointed full University Professor of Experimental Physics and establishes the department of Soft Matter Physics at his university. He soon becomes one of the most successful, most influential and most recognised scientific researchers and academic teachers at the JKU Linz. During more than 20 years in Linz, Siegfried Bauer further developed a unique style of research and teaching together with his team. His approach to science starts with open questions and includes unconventional or orthogonal “out-of-the-box” ways of thinking in a playful manner. In Siegfried’s view, occasional failure is not only taken into account, but is seen as a necessary condition for eventual success because we learn mainly from mistakes and failures – just like our children and our best students. The essence of Siegfried Bauer’s research and teaching “philosophy” is probably its focus on the human beings who are the actors of the scientific process, who enjoy to play and to develop like children, who need (and want) to exchange ideas and to work together, who naturally bring a rich diversity of talents and competences to the process, and who always need to overcome inherent restrictions from traditions, conventions, rulebooks, etc. Siegfried Bauer’s approach overcomes boundaries between disciplines, between theory and application, between different cultures and countries, between arts and sciences, between philosophy and engineering, and – last, but not least – between seriousness and playfulness. Maybe his style is best characterised with the words of Georg Christoph Lichtenberg who wrote around 1795: “The science of electricity is, along the common path, now so well trodden and scoured that nothing is to be gained anymore on the highway – one must march cross-country and leap over ditches. This method which one could well call unmethodical is, by the way, to be recommended very much indeed.”[1] Siegfried Bauer himself occasionally referred to Paul Feyerabend, the Austrian/US-American philosopher of science, and his book “Against Method: Outline of an Anarchist Theory of Knowledge” in 1975.[2] Given his unconventional approach, it was probably unavoidable that Siegfried Bauer sometimes caused anger and resistance among his scientific peers, since he questioned beloved certainties and authoritative conventions in a playful manner and often used Socratic probing in his thinking and teaching. And when he felt that creative, well-founded new approaches were ruled “nonsense”, he stepped in and defended the right to think differently and to err, as there is no absolute truth. Over the past two decades, the very original and highly creative “Bauer approach” yielded impressive successes and results in research and teaching within the Soft Matter Physics department at the JKU Linz. Only a few particularly noteworthy examples are mentioned in the following: With his foresight and insight, Siegfried Bauer significantly advanced the new field of polymer ferroelectrets that began in Finland and that he named and led to a lasting success story in research and engineering together with his peers all over the world. Siegfried Bauer’s new concepts and research in the area of flexible and stretchable polymer-based electronics led to fundamental advances and to the development of practical devices – sometimes in close collaboration with international partners. His team in Linz successfully demonstrated several essential steps to lead the way from “crazy ideas” to technically feasible applications. Siegfried made important contributions to a new way of thinking about active soft matter and its technical use. Starting from the notion that devices suitable for people should not disturb the user and should ideally not even be perceived by the user, Siegfried Bauer and his team – together with international partners – spearheaded the development of imperceptible and biocompatible electronics including sensors, actuators and displays. In this area, the research of the Linz group is very quickly adopted and successfully advanced by other teams all over the world, and it is sometimes underestimated how much the new field owes to Siegfried Bauer’s visionary and playful creativity. In his last paper just published in the American Journal of Physics, Siegfried and his team used a high-speed camera in the foyer of a high-rise university building to follow the fall of paper cones with high precision. From a critical assessment of the results, it is concluded that the philosophical differences between Aristotle and Galileo about falling objects disappear if the implicitly included conditions of each situation are explicitly taken into account. The underlying experiments and their careful analysis can be employed to teach about multiple possibilities of objects to fall in different situations. In this case, direct experimental evidence helps to develop a more precise physical thinking already in high schools and also later in universities. The unusual approach and the deep insight of Siegfried Bauer and his research team yielded not only many highly cited and internationally recognised publications, but led also to several awards and honors. Here, we only mention the awarding of a rare and prestigious Advanced Investigator Grant by the European Research Council (ERC) for Siegfried Bauer in 2011 and his appointments as fellow by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) for “contributions to the understanding and application of electroactive polymer dielectrics” and by the Society of Photo- Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE) for “achievements in plastic electronic devices and soft matter physics” in late 2015 and late 2018, respectively. As documented in his publications, Siegfried Bauer had many professional and personal friends and scientific collaborators all over the world – from Israel to Ireland, Canada to China, New Zealand to North America. He was an active contributor to several learned societies, to international conferences and to leading scientific and technical journals, e.g. as Associate Editor and Member of the Editorial Board of Applied Physics A (Springer), Applied Physics Review (AIP), Extreme Mechanics Letters (Elsevier), IEEE Transactions on Dielectrics and Electrical Insulation (IEEE DEIS), and Proceedings of the Royal Society A (The Royal Society); as member or co-chair of conference steering committees for the Conference on Electroactive Polymer Actuators and Devices (SPIE), the International Conference on Electromechanically Active Polymer Transducers and Artificial Muscles (EuroEAP Society), the International Symposium on Electrets (IEEE Dielectrics and Electrical Insulation Society), Symposia of the Materials Research Society (MRS), etc. In addition, Siegfried was in high demand as an experienced, polite and careful reviewer for several international journals and high-level funding agencies. The international scientific community and the Johannes Kepler University Linz have lost an unusual and unusually successful researcher and teacher, a beautiful mind and a very special person – and last, but not least a very good friend. Siegfried Bauer was a man full of curiosity; with a unique view on the wide world and on his environment; always keen to learn from every experience and even from his failures; a person who trusted his friends and colleagues as well as his own abilities, but who also knew his limitations; equipped with a skeptical, questioning attitude towards so- called authorities and established knowledge; with a great sense of humor that was sometimes very special, but never offensive; someone who enjoyed lateral thinking and finding unusual, but convincing solutions to any problem that interested him – and there were many scientific and non-scientific problems that attracted Siegfried’s searching mind. Siegfried is survived by his wife Simona, his daughter Lara, his son Lukas, his mother, and two of his brothers. His family, his friends and colleagues all over the world, his university, his former and present students, and others who knew him will tremendously miss Siegfried Bauer, but will always remember him as a very special person full of humor and empathy and as an inspiring and supporting companion and guide. His memory, his philosophy and his work will remain alive in and through all who met him. Reimund Gerhard, University of Potsdam and IEEE DEIS Martin Kaltenbrunner, Johannes Kepler University Linz Additional sources for information about Siegfried Bauer: https://scilog.fwf.ac.at/en/environment-and-technology/5076/only-those-… https://www.jku.at/en/institute-of-experimental-physics/soft-matter-phy… team/siegfried-bauer/ [1] – From the entry K384 in a scrap book (“Sudelbuch”) for 1793-1796 by Georg Christoph Lichtenberg. Original German text: “Die Lehre von der Elektrizität ist jetzt da, wo man gewöhnlich passiert, so abgetreten und abgesucht, dass an der Heerstraße nichts mehr zu gewinnen ist; man muss querfeldein marschieren und über die Gräben setzen. Diese Methode, die man wohl die unmethodische nennen könnte, ist überhaupt nebenher sehr zu empfehlen.” [2] – Published 1975 in London. German title: “Wider den Methodenzwang.” Suhrkamp, Frankfurt am Main 1976.