Bruce Harold John McKellar

Early years and education McKellar grew up in Bedgerabong in NSW, attending Bedgerabong Primary School, which was then a one-teacher school. His father was the teacher. He then attended Forbes High School before moving to Sydney at 16 to study a Bachelor of Science at the University of Sydney, which he completed with First Class Honours and the University Medal for Physics.

He received his PhD from the University of Sydney in 1965, and a Doctor of Science from the University of Melbourne in 1976.

Academic career Immediately on completion of his PhD, McKellar was appointed as a lecturer at the University of Sydney. In 1965, McKellar was invited by J. Robert Oppenheimer to become a member of the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, USA, which he undertook from 1966 to 1968. He then returned to the University of Sydney. In 1972, at the age of 30, McKellar was appointed as the Professor of Theoretical Physics at Melbourne University. He retired from this role in 2007. His work on weak interactions led to the calculation of the electric dipole moments expected for the nucleon and atoms in various models of these interactions. This work then evolved into studies of related effects in the B meson system.

McKellar and his students also did foundational work on the behaviour of neutrinos propagating through a dense background of neutrinos as one finds in the early universe. He is well known for the "He McKellar Wilkens" phase, a seminal quantum physics result predicted by He and McKellar and Wilkens (independently) in 1993–94.

McKellar has made a significant contribution to the development of the study of physics in Australia. He was elected a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science in 1987, was its Vice President for Physical Sciences from 2000–2004 and its Foreign Secretary from 2004–2006. and on the Council of the Association of Asia Pacific Physical Societies for many years. of the International Council for Science (ICSU) (2009–2011), as well as the Australia and New Zealand Association for the Advancement of Science (ANZAAS) (1992–1998). 2009: Matthew Flinders Medal and Lecture, Australian Academy of Science 2006: Harrie Massey Medal and Prize, Institute of Physics (UK) and the Australian Institute of Physics 2001: Centenary Medal 1992: Walter Boas Medal, Australian Institute of Physics 1991: Thomas Ranken Lyle Medal, Australian Academy of Science 1987: Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science 1977: Research Medal, Royal Society of Victoria 1973: Pawsey Medal, Australian Academy of Science 1962: University Medal, University of Sydney

Personal life Bruce McKellar married Loris Huckel in 1963. They have 2 children and 4 grandchildren and live in Melbourne, Australia.

Selected publications McKELLAR, B.H.J. — The One Pion Exchange Contribution to the Weak Parity Violating Nucleon-Nucleon Potential. Physics Letters 26B: 107 – 108 (1967). McKELLAR, B.H.J. and RAJARAMAN, R. — Three Body Forces in Nuclear Matter. Physical Review Letters 21: 450 – 453 (1968). LASSEY, K.R. and McKELLAR, B.H.J. — Parity Non Conservation in (n, p) Capture at Thermal Energies: The influence of Strong and Weak Interactions. Nuclear Physics A 260: 413 – 445 (1976). COON, S.A., SCADRON, M.D., McNAMEE, P.C., BARRETT, B.R., BLATT, D.W.E., and McKELLAR, B.H.J. — The Two Pion Exchange Three Nucleon Potential and Nuclear Matter. Nuclear Physics A 317: 242 — 287 (1979). This is the Tucson Melbourne Force paper. McKELLAR, B.H.J. — The Influence of Mixing of Finite Mass Neutrinos on Beta Decay Spectra. Physics Letters 97B: 93 – 94 (1980). McKELLAR, B.H.J., and GIBSON, B.F. — Nonmesonic decay of Heavy Λ-Hypernuclei. Physical Review C 30: 322 – 330 (1984) R.D.C. MILLER, and McKELLAR, B.H.J. — Effective Field Theory and Weak Non Leptonic Interactions. Physics Reports 106: 169 — 296 (1984). McKELLAR, B.H.J., CHOUDHURY, S.R., HE, X-G and PAKVASA, S. — The Neutron Electric Dipole Moment in the Standard KM Model. Physics Letters 197 B: 556 – 560 (1987). HE, X.-G., McKELLAR, B.H.J. and PAKVASA, S. — The Neutron Electric Dipole Moment. International Journal of Modern Physics A 4: 5011 – 5046 (1989), erratum A6: 1063 (1991) HE, XIAO-GANG, and McKELLAR, B.H.J. — Topological Phase Due to Electric Dipole Moment and Magnetic Monopole Interaction. Physical Review A 47: 3424 – 3245 (1993) McKELLAR, BRUCE H.J. and THOMSON, M.J. — Oscillating Neutrinos in the Early Universe. Physical Review D 49: 2710 – 2728 (1994) STEPHENSON, G. J. Jr, GOLDMAN T., and McKELLAR, B. H. J. — Neutrino Clouds. International Journal of Modern Physics A 13, 2765 – 2790 (1998) HE, X.-G., McKELLAR, B.H.J. Hadron decay amplitudes from B ---> K π and B ---> π π decays, ArXiv:hep-ph/0410098; (2004).