The Growing Danger of Nuclear Weapons (and how Physicists can help reduce it)

Although today's nuclear arsenals are not much in the news, they pose enormous risks for all humanity. Moreover, many treaties that have reduced the danger of nuclear weapons are now under threat or are being abandoned, and $1.3 trillion is currently scheduled to be spent on new nuclear weapons systems. We face a renewed nuclear arms race, with potentially catastrophic consequences. Historically, physicists have played a critical role in helping the public and decision makers understand the threat posed by nuclear weapons and what can be done to reduce the threat. I will explain the growing nuclear crisis and describe a new project sponsored by the American Physical Society to support and mobilize physicists to reduce the nuclear threat.

Fred Lamb is the Brand and Monica Fortner Chair of Theoretical Astrophysics Emeritus and a core faculty member in the Arms Control and Domestic & International Security Program at the University of Illinois. As an expert on space policy, ballistic missiles and missile defenses, and the technical aspects of nuclear test bans, he has been a consultant to the Defense Department, national laboratories, and Congressional committees. He co-chaired the American Physical Society's 2003 Study of Boost-Phase Missile Defense and is chair of the current APS POPA Study of Missile Defense and National Security. The focus of his scientific research is high-energy and relativistic astrophysics and dense matter. He is a Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a Fellow of the APS and shared the Leo Szilard Award of the APS for his leadership of the 2003 APS study of boost-phase missile defense.

Stewart Prager is a professor of astrophysical sciences at Princeton University, and is affiliated with the Program on Science and Global Security. From 2009 - 2016 he was Director of the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, following many years as a physics professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His area of research is plasma physics and fusion energy. While at Wisconsin, Prager was director of the Madison Symmetric Torus (MST) experimental facility. He also served as founding director of the Center for Magnetic Self-Organization in Laboratory and Astrophysical Plasmas, established through the National Science Foundation program of "physics frontier centers." He recently co-founded the Physicists Coalition for Nuclear Threat Reduction.