Paul John Ellis, professor of physics at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, passed away peacefully at his home in St. Louis Park, Minnesota, on 20 February 2005 of a heart attack. He was very active in teaching and research at Minnesota for over 30 years, from the time he joined the university’s school of physics and astronomy in 1973 right up to his unexpected death.
Paul was born in Northampton, UK, on 25 May 1941. He earned his BS in physics at the University of Bristol in 1962 and his PhD in theoretical nuclear physics at the University of Manchester in 1966. He was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Michigan from 1966 to 1968, at Rutgers University from 1968 to 1970, and at the University of Oxford from 1970 to 1973. After joining the University of Minnesota as assistant professor, he was promoted to associate professor in 1977 and to professor in 1982. Paul also had a number of visiting positions at various universities and laboratories in the US and Europe over the course of his career.
For more than two decades, Paul published extensively on coupled-channel approaches to nuclear reactions and to effective interactions within nuclei. He frequently published with his Minnesota nuclear-theory colleagues Benjamin Bayman and Yau-Chien Tang. The 1970s was a special decade because of the close collaboration between the three theorists and a group of experimentalists from the university working at the tandem accelerator on the bank of the Mississippi River. During this period Paul published seven papers with his wife, Alicja, who also has a PhD in nuclear theory, before she began working in the private sector.
Around 1990, Paul’s research interests shifted to the study of dense nuclear matter as manifested in neutron stars and heavy ion collisions. Paul made remarkable contributions with an increasingly sophisticated set of effective Lagrangians, generalized to account for scale and chiral symmetry. He coauthored the highly cited review Composition and Structure of Protoneutron Stars (Elsevier, 1997). He also worked extensively on a relativistic description of the interaction of pions with nucleons, nuclei, and nuclear matter.
Paul taught physics courses at all levels with interest, and he treated his students with high regard. In 1981, early in his career, he was honored with the Outstanding Teacher Award from the university’s Institute of Technology. More important, perhaps, is that a group of his students presented him with a certificate that proclaimed that the three greatest British imports were the Beatles, Monty Python, and Paul Ellis.
With his family, Paul enjoyed many activities, especially walking, boating, swimming, golfing, and traveling. He liked steam locomotives, and he collected calendars and screen savers with their photos. He had a very strong belief in human rights and in freedom and democracy. He and his wife took great pride in participating in state and national political activities and campaigns. Paul was also a strong advocate for the safe and humane treatment of animals.
The atmosphere Paul projected around him was so magical that one immediately felt at ease and could talk about anything with him. He made people feel equal and included, and he always supported his friends and colleagues in a kind and gentle yet unswerving way. The community has sustained a great loss. This extraordinary gentleman will be missed for years to come.
