Yong-Ki Kim: This wasn’t in the police report that told of the death of a 74-year-old tourist a week ago today on Chena Hot Springs Road.
When the pickup truck smashed into a parked car, it brought an end to the distinguished career of Dr. Yong-Ki Kim.
He was a physicist who studied the secrets of the atom, first at the Argonne National Laboratory, where he became the senior physicist, and later at the National Institute of Standards and Technology.
Carl Williams, the chief of the atomic physics division at the technology institute in Maryland, stated in an e-mail to the News-Miner that Kim is credited with outstanding contributions in fusion and plasma science research.
“One of his most notable achievements was the development, with Eugene Rudd of the University of Nebraska, of the Binary-Encounter-Bethe theory, which allowed the precise calculation of ionization cross sections for numerous atoms, ions and molecules relevant to fusion research,” he said.
Kim retired from the lab in 2002, but continued as a part-time contractor. He published more than 110 scientific papers and submitted what will be his final research report just a week before his death. He was in Alaska on vacation with his wife and son.
» Dermot Cole:
