Michael Witherell stands quietly confident in front of a blackboard scrawled with equations that speak to a lifetime spent at the frontiers of physics. When I photographed him at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and later at the Advanced Light Source, it was clear that he carries not just the responsibility of leadership but the deep curiosity of a scientist who never stopped asking questions.
Trained as an experimental particle physicist, Witherell’s early work helped illuminate the fundamental building blocks of matter. He made his name in the study of weak interactions and symmetry violations, helping to shape our understanding of how the universe is structured at its most elemental level. His research has been published widely and cited often, but it is his long view of science that leaves the deeper impression.
Witherell served as Director of Fermilab before coming to Berkeley, and throughout his career he has shown an unusual ability to balance institutional leadership with the quiet precision of laboratory work. At Berkeley Lab, he leads one of the most complex and important research institutions in the world, home to thousands of scientists working on everything from renewable energy to quantum computing to climate modeling. Walking with him through the Lab, you see how thoroughly he knows its people, its history, and its future trajectory.
One of the places we visited was the Advanced Light Source, a powerful synchrotron facility that enables researchers to peer into materials at the atomic level. He spoke about the ALS not with the administrative detachment of a distant executive but with the enthusiasm of someone who understands exactly why it matters. What it unlocks. What it might still reveal.
Though he now operates in the realm of budgets, partnerships, and national policy, Witherell never lost the perspective of a working scientist. He is the kind of leader who still lights up when discussing a clever experiment or a surprising result. That balance between rigor and imagination, ambition and humility, is what makes him such a rare figure in American science.
The chalkboard behind him in this portrait is not for show. It is where ideas are worked out, erased, revised, and written again. Like the lab itself, it reflects a process in motion. That is where Witherell thrives. Not in the certainty of answers, but in the continual refinement of the question.
