Katharine B. Gebbie
(Contact Information)

Katharine B. Gebbie is Director of the Physics Laboratory of the National Institute of Standards and Technology. The Laboratory supports industry by providing measurement services and research for electronic, optical and radiation technologies. Its focus is on atomic, molecular, optical and radiation physics, reflecting the continuing importance of these disciplines in developing new measurement technology.

Dr. Gebbie graduated from Bryn Mawr College with a B.A. degree in physics and subsequently earned a B.S. degree in astronomy and a Ph.D. in physics from University College London. She joined NIST in 1968 as a physicist in the Quantum Physics Division of JILA, a cooperative enterprise between NIST and the University of Colorado in Boulder. She has worked extensively on the physics of the solar and stellar atmospheres. Before being appointed Director of the newly formed Physics Laboratory in 1991, she served as Chief of the Quantum Physics Division and Acting Director of the Center or Atomic Molecular and Optical Physics. Dr. Gebbie is a Fellow of the American Physical Society, a Fellow of JILA, and a member of several professional societies including Sigma Xi and American Women in Science. She is a member of the American Physical Society (APS) Physics Planning Committee, a member of the Fellowship Committee, APS Division of Atomic, Molecular, and Optical Physics, a past member and chair of the APS Committee on the Status of Women in Physics, and a member of the International Union of Pure and Applied Physicists Working Group on Women in Physics. She has received several awards, including the Department of Commerce Gold Medal and the WISE (Women in Science and Engineering) Lifetime Achievement Award.