The collection is divided into two series: Research and Personal Materials and Teaching and Administrative Materials. Terwilliger's curriculum vita (including a list of publications and classes taught) and yearly letters summarizing his research activities are located in the first folder of Box 1.
Kent M. Terwilliger was born June 17, 1924 in San Jose, California. He received his B.S. in physics from the California Institute of Technology in 1949, and his Ph.D. in physics from the University of California, Berkeley in 1952. He joined the University of Michigan Physics Department as an instructor in 1952, and became assistant professor in 1956, associate professor in 1960, and full professor in 1965. Professor Terwilliger specialized in high-energy particle physics, and specifically in the study of acceleration of polarized proton beams, a form of research which analyzes proton behavior during violent collisions.
In the 1950s, Professor Terwilliger was involved with the Midwest Universities Research Association (MURA), working with Lawrence Jones on accelerator design. They developed a system using the beam stacking procedure and quadrupole lenses which provided aid for colliding beam experiments requiring a small target size. This system was incorporated into the design of the CERN Intersecting Storage Rings.
In the early 1960s, Terwilliger did work in the area of particle detection. While the bubble chamber (developed in the 1950s by Donald Glaser) was the most well-known of the University of Michigan's contributions to the methods of particle detection, problems with the automated scanning required by the bubble chamber led to exploration of alternative particle detectors. The initiation of spark chamber work at Michigan by Terwilliger and Don Meyer was one such exploration. During the 1960s, Terwilliger was involved in a series of experiments using the spark chamber: an experiment to study a new particle; an elastic -p scattering experiment at the Argonne National Laboratory Zero Gradient Synchrotron (ZGS); an experiment to study the meson; and experiments studying backward inelastic and elastic -p scattering.
During the 1970s and 1980s, Terwilliger worked with Professor Alan Krisch's research group, doing polarized proton-proton scattering at the ZGS, and studying the dependence of the differential and total cross sections on the transverse spin state of the beam and target particles. In 1978, Krisch's group instigated a study for the conversion of the Brookhaven National Laboratory Alternating Gradient Synchrotron (AGS) to polarized proton acceleration, since shutdown of the ZGS in October 1979 would effectively end their work at the Argonne National Laboratory. From 1980 to 1984 Krisch and Terwilliger spent much time assisting the BNL in developing polarized proton acceleration capability at the AGS. Michigan's specific responsibilities were for development and production of 12 pulsed quadrupoles and for internal and high energy polarimeters. Terwilliger also continued to collaborate with Krisch in studying spin dependences in high energy large transverse momentum proton-proton elastic scattering.
During the late 1980s, a major concern of Krisch's group was that a successful future of polarized beams at much higher energies would require new methods of avoiding depolarizing resonances. The Russian "Siberian Snake" scheme was seen as a possible solution, and as of May 1988 an experimental test was planned at the Indiana University Cyclotron Facility.
Professor Terwilliger served on a number of national high energy physics committees and panels during his career. In 1964 he received both a Guggenheim Fellowship and a CERN visiting scientist fellowship to study in Geneva, Switzerland. In 1972 he again received a CERN visiting scientist fellowship. Terwilliger also served on numerous University of Michigan committees, including the Physics Department Executive Committee and the 1982-1983 Review Committee for the Michigan Memorial Phoenix Project Grant Program. From 1985 to 1989, Terwilliger served as the Physics Department Associate Chairman for Research.
