Since stepping down as laboratory director in 1999, I have devoted an increasing fraction of my time to international issues. I am involved with energy, environment, and sustainability issues, particularly as they involve new energy sources free of greenhouse gases.

While a lab Director can get done the things that he regards as important, he has the more important job of bringing out the best ideas of the broader scientific community.

In 1948 I entered the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, undecided between studies of chemistry and physics, but my first year convinced me that physics was more interesting to me.

Modern science is fast-moving, and no laboratory can exist for long with a program based on old facilities. Innovation and renewal are required to keep a laboratory on the frontiers of science.

I was born on 22 March 1931 in New York, the elder child of Abraham and Fanny Richter.

Since stepping down as laboratory director in 1999, I have devoted an increasing fraction of my time to international issues. I am involved with energy, environment, and sustainability issues, particularly as they involve new energy sources free of greenhouse gases.

As accelerators reach higher and higher energies, we may need a new Standard Model, or, at least, today's may need to be modified, but that's the way science operates.

During my first year as a graduate student, we worked on a measurement of the isotope shift and hyperfine structure of mercury isotopes.

During my years at the synchrotron laboratory, I had become interested in the theory of quantum electrodynamics and had decided that what I would most like to do after completing my dissertation work was to probe the short-distance behavior of the electromagnetic interaction.

For nuclear power to have a future, we'll either need more Yucca Mountains or a way to decrease the stuff we put there.

I got no thrill from solving an integral equation, but I did get a thrill from building an exotic piece of equipment that worked.

I've become interested in the impact of climate change on the world and the future of energy needs for the developing world.

In 1960, I married Laurose Becker. We have two children: Elizabeth, born in 1961, and Matthew, born in 1963.

Iran wants to join the group of countries that want to know about the biggest things, like space.

Is the sky falling? No. It's maybe drooping a bit.

Politics is a lot tougher than physics.

So now, if we don't fund the physical sciences, where will the Next Big Thing come from?

The reason why Three Mile Island makes such a big impact is because of a Jane Fonda movie called 'The China Syndrome.'

The sun doesn't shine at night, and wind power is highly variable. To meet our emissions goals, we're going to have to grasp every arrow in the quiver, and nuclear is one of those arrows.

Theorists can create all sorts of theories which go beyond the Standard Model. But there's not one bit of experimental evidence to point out which way you should go.

Total failure isn't something I want to spend a lot of time envisioning. I'm pretty sure I'll recognize it if it comes.

What I found was that I thoroughly enjoyed the plumbing of experiment.

What lots of people have been trying to do ever since is find what's beyond the current Standard Model. So far, it has stood impervious to all attacks.

What struck me first on reading the Ten Hoeve-Jacobson paper was how small the consequences of the radiation release from the Fukushima reactor accident are projected to be compared to the devastation wrought by the giant earthquake and tsunami.

What we're really after is trying to understand what's in the mind of God.

While a lab director can get done the things that he regards as important, he has the more important job of bringing out the best ideas of the broader scientific community. I learned this early in my career while I was leading the construction of the SPEAR facility.

Starving the future to feed the present is a mistake. It leads to obsolescence and stagnation. Sometimes, it is hard to make this understood.

If you give it good concentration, good energy, good heart and good performance, the song will play you.

We need to have a culture that says 'the less energy you can use to be comfortable, the better off you are and the better you should feel about yourself'.

I merely took the energy it takes to pout and wrote some blues.

I didn't know at the time that the energy that I was giving off was like a battle Emcee.

The young people look great on television. They're youthful and have a lot of zip and energy, but when you see them live, they can only do about 20 minutes because they haven't got the training to hold an audience for an hour and a half or so.

It takes a lot more energy to fail than to succeed, since it takes a lot of concentrated energy to hold on to beliefs that don't work.

I try to give positive energy in all my shows.

In modelling, there is no point in trying to prove you have a brain, so why even bother? I'd sooner save the energy for something more meaningful.

I was part of it, and I am still part of it today in terms of what it means to a whole new generation of people who are interested in the enduring energy, achievements, spirit and creativity that exemplified our era.

I always like having kid energy around. I think it's good for a movie, even when you're doing dramatic stuff.

You had to decompress the pressure before the race. I taught my heart to relax. I lay down before the race. It gave me more energy just before the race.

As long as I had easy access to psychedelics at the government-sponsored research project, most of my energy went into psychedelic sessions.

You can have anything you want if you want it desperately enough. You must want it with an inner exuberance that erupts through the skin and joins the energy that created the world.

Nerves provide me with energy... It's when I don't have them, when I feel at ease, that's when I get worried.

Electric cars aren't pollution-free; they have to get their energy from somewhere.

When I see someone who is starved, they don't look alert. They don't have boundless energy. If you're too skinny, it looks like you're near death.

Why is it so painful to watch a person sink? Because there is something unnatural in it, for nature demands personal progress, evolution, and every backward step means wasted energy.

Comedy is so hard; it's so much harder than drama. The pacing of it, the energy of it.

If for no other reason than the energy crisis now facing this country, the federal government should be eager to become partners with us in rebuilding our city.

It takes a lot of energy to teach.

Any long work in which poetry is persistent, be it epic or drama or narrative, is really a succession of separate poetic experiences governed into a related whole by an energy distinct from that which evoked them.

I believe that the average guy in the street will give up a great deal, if he really understands the cost of not giving it up. In fact, we may find that, while we're drastically cutting our energy consumption, we're actually raising our standard of living.