Chairman, Division of Physics, Mathematics and Astronomy, 1998- ; Professor of Physics, 1965- ; Research Fellow, 1961-1962, 1964-1965.

Thomas Tombrello received his undergraduate and graduate education at Rice University. He came to Caltech as a postdoctoral fellow in physics in 1961 and worked in the Kellogg Radiation Laboratory under Thomas Lauritsen. After a brief period teaching at Yale, he returned to Caltech permanently in 1964. His principal research interests are ion-beam analysis and modification of materials and dynamical studies of ion-solid interactions. In 1994 Tombrello became the recipient of the first Richard P. Feynman Przie for Excellence in Teaching at Caltech.

Oral history, 1998. This 31-page interview is one in the series of oral histories conducted by Shirley Cohen on the LIGO Project at Caltech and its relationship to physics and the Institute.