Prof. em. Dr. Peter Grieder

PETER GRIEDER obtained his MS degree in physics from the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago in 1957. He did the research for his thesis with the Argonne group of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission at the University of Chicago. There he took part in cosmic ray physics seminars of Professors Simpson, Schein and Chandrasekhar. In 1961 he got his PhD from the University of Bern, Switzerland, where he did his research under Prof. F.G. Houtermans in high energy cosmic ray physics. He then worked successively as a postdoctoral scientist at the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen with Prof. Bernard Peters on quarkhunt experiments, at CERN in Geneva in the experimental and later on in the theoretical physics division with Drs. R. Hagedorn and M. Jacob on models of high energy hadronic interactions and multiparticle production, in conjunction with air showers.

In 1968 he was appointed lecturer at the University of Bern, and in 1970 visiting professor for one year at the Institute for Nuclear Studies of the University of Tokyo, where he worked in the cosmic ray group of Prof. K. Suga. In 1978 he was appointed professor of physics at the University of Bern. From 1985 to 1987 he was secretary of the Swiss Physical Society.

His research activities comprise high energy phenomena, extensive air showers and neutrino astronomy. He developed the ASICO air shower simulation program system which later on was renamed CORSIKA, that is widely used today with a variety of modern event generators, developed by many different authors. He was coinitiator together with Prof. Fred Reines, Nobel Laureate, and colleagues from other institutions of the pioneering DUMAND neutrino telescope project in Hawaii, that was the template for all presently existing and planned giant neutrino telescopes. He was guest professor for many years at the University of Hawaii and is the author of numerous scientific articles and several books.