Leadership Announcement - Wyant College of Optical Sciences

Dear colleagues,

I am writing to announce that Dr. Brian P. Anderson has been appointed interim dean of the Wyant College of Optical Sciences, effective July 1.  

Dr. Anderson has been actively involved in graduate-level teaching and research since joining the Optical Sciences faculty in 2001. He has served as the college’s associate dean for Graduate Academic Affairs since 2019, where he has led impactful growth and development of the college’s graduate programs, and has guided, advised, and mentored hundreds of MS and PhD students.   

Dr. Anderson’s research centers on the physics of Bose-Einstein condensates, the coldest substances in the known universe, which can only be created and experimentally studied in state-of-the-art optics laboratories. For over 25 years, his internationally recognized experimental and theoretical work in this field has concentrated on how these substances both act as a fluid and adhere to the laws of quantum mechanics that are evident at such cold temperatures. Dr. Anderson’s widely cited research has appeared in such journals as Science, Nature, and Physical Review Letters. His research has been supported through multiple government grants and has helped provide insights into complex physical phenomena such as superfluidity and turbulence. As an educator, Dr. Anderson has taught graduate-level quantum mechanics courses for over 20 years and is the author of the Field Guide to Quantum Mechanics.   

As interim dean, Dr. Anderson is committed to serving the college to advance its mission to educate students and provide them with practical and highly competitive technical skills; maintaining academic excellence; and supporting cutting edge optics research activities.   

I am delighted to welcome Dr. Anderson into this role, as he brings his experience, leadership, and vision to support the success of the college’s students, faculty and staff, and to further the missions of the college and the University of Arizona.  

Thank you to Dean Tom Koch for his outstanding leadership of the Wyant College of Optical Sciences for the past 13 years and I wish him a happy retirement. 

Sincerely,

Patricia A. Prelock 
Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs

This email was sent to all students, faculty, staff and DCCs in the Wyant College of Optical Sciences.