Bob Horton

Chapter Affiliation

Rice University - Texas Medical Center

Background Information

Statement

The interdisciplinary nature of Sigma Xi provides a fertile environment for the free exchange of ideas not only across disciplines but also across those “perceived gaps” – for example, the gap between academia and industry – that we are all trying to minimize. Those “gaps” are perceived to exist among academic, governmental, professional societal, industrial, and independent research organizations and groups. As a Full Member of Sigma Xi since 1972, I strongly believe our duty is to promote the importance of this exchange among our peers, transcending those “gaps” in order to keep alive the desire of learning beyond the narrow scope of our disciplines and to foster the next generation of researchers no matter where their interests lead them.

I was an Assistant Professor at LSU from 1971 - 1975; therefore, during my graduate research years, post-doctoral training, and a few years at LSU, I was in academia, but I really learned a only little about academia. In the ~44-year period thereafter, I re-trained on-the-job as a Petroleum Engineer and worked mostly as an industrial researcher in new product and new technology development in the Petroleum Industry. Thereby, I learned a bit more about industrial research. Subsequent to my retirement from industrial research, I have taken on less formal pro bono roles as a mentor to young researchers and chief leader of a very small non-profit.

Unfortunately, by joining only their own narrow professional specialty societies, many scientists do not take advantage of the free exchange of ideas across disciplines. I have become much more keenly aware of these needs since I was invited by the Board of Directors (BoD) of the Rice University / Texas Medical Center Chapter in 1999 to run for election to the office of Chapter Qualifications and Membership Committee Chair. Continuing in that role since 1999, I have become keenly aware of the need to keep our membership standards at least as high as they were in 1972 when the University of California Berkeley Chapter elected me and to actively support membership-expansion initiatives like the Sigma Xi Affiliates Program, the Sigma Xi Explorers Program and the establishment of “Sister Chapters” as a means of overcoming some of the barriers to the creation of new chapters, especially outside the US. Over the years I have worked very hard among the technical communities in the Greater Houston Area and at our Rice University and Texas Medical Center campuses to keep our chapter relevant and viable. If elected to the Committee on Nominations, I will use my experience to assist the Committee and its Chair as needed and I will work towards promoting the relevance of scientific endeavors both in all our campuses and in the community at large.

I am currently donating a flow-assurance-related Provisional Patent Application to Rice University. While the Chapter has an excellent relationship with the Texas Medical Center, it is clear that Sigma Xi is NOT so important to the research enterprise at Rice University as it could be. It is hoped that the situation for Sigma Xi at Rice can be improved in the future. Accordingly, as a “Thrice Rice” alum I have been dispatched as an emissary by the Board of Directors of the Rice University / Texas Medical Center Chapter of Sigma Xi on a mission to attempt to improve the liaison between our Sigma Xi Chapter and Rice University. This, it is hoped, may be accomplished by my working to support the Rice Brine Chemistry Consortium, the Rice Hydrocarbon Thermodynamics and Flow Assurance Consortium, the Rice Oshman Engineering Design Kitchen (OEDK), OEDK Executive Director Kavalewitz-Dern, Engineering Dean Chapman, and Professors Vargas, and Oden.

Bob Horton

Chapter Affiliation

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