Interview with Thomas A. Tombrello - Caltech Oral Histories

Tombrello–209
TOMBRELLO: It’s nice that they go away. Though we have one great success who didn’t go
away, and that’s Kerry Vahala [Jenkins Professor of Information Science and Technology and
professor of applied physics]. Sterl Phinney, Libbrecht, Vahala were in the same class—the
class of 1980 at Caltech. That was some class! That was an interesting bunch of people. We are
lucky to have them back. Vahala also got his PhD here with Yariv. Libbrecht worked for Bob
[Robert H.] Dicke at Princeton. Phinney went to Cambridge. It’s nice that they get away and
see a bit of the world and then realize that Caltech is Heaven. They come back. It’s a great
place, and our students are fantastic. But I’ve said that so many times, it’s getting tiresome.
You’re beginning to see what I’m trying to say: There was a strategic framework for everything.
ASPATURIAN: Within which you were establishing a number of new initiatives.
TOMBRELLO: Right. The idea behind the JPL thing was to cement the relationship with JPL, but
at the same time to complement some of the things on campus that we needed to complement.
Didn’t hurt JPL either. That’s one of the worries for the future: Will Caltech always be able to
hang on to the management contract for JPL? There have always been these threats from NASA
about putting it up for bids. We’ve dodged that bullet several times. Can we continue to? JPL is
very important for Caltech, because of the leverage that both sides get out of it. These joint
appointments mean a great deal. We’ve done two small spacecraft projects within the PMA
Division to help JPL out. One was GALEX [Galaxy Evolution Explorer], Chris [D. Christopher]
Martin’s [professor of physics] ultraviolet orbiter. Now we’re doing NuSTAR on campus for
Fiona Harrison, which is an X-ray measurement project.
The division’s relationship with JPL has been good—in fact, I used to have regular
meetings with Elachi, because he and I were opposite numbers for a while. When he moved up
to the directorship, I met with Larry Simmons [deputy director of JPL’s Space and Earth Science
Programs Directorate]. When Simmons retired, it was Jakob van Zyl . It was very important to
stay in step with someone with whom you had so many joint projects. It meant I had a lot of
extra activities, but it also meant that I have an awful lot of opportunities with JPL. As I said,
when we needed money to get the CCAT concept study started, half the money came from Jakob
van Zyl and half of it came from me. I would say that since then, more money has come from
JPL than has come from Caltech for CCAT, which would be a 25-meter sub-millimeter telescope
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