Biography of Francisco de la Cruz
- Philip Downey, Freelance Science Writer
Superconductor materials have no resistance to the flow of electricity and are thus useful in a vast range of present and future scientific and technical applications, such as high-energy particle research, sensitive electromagnetic instrumentation, magnetic levitation, biomagnetics, production of high magnetic fields, commercial electricity, and computers. The properties of superconducting metal alloys and other compounds are made evident at low temperatures. Physicist Francisco de la Cruz, a Foreign Associated Member of the National Academy of Sciences since 2002, has spent most of his research career studying such properties, especially as they pertain to magnetic vortices in superconductors.
In his Inaugural Article in this issue of PNAS, de la Cruz and colleagues examined the elastic properties of superconducting vortex structures (1). Says de la Cruz, “In a way, it is simpler to use the vortices to study elastic behavior than other elastic systems.” The team introduced external magnetic forces to see how vortex lattice structures respond. “By studying the elastic vortex lattices... we can learn about other elastic systems and elastic matter,” he says (2).
Francisco de la Cruz. Photograph courtesy of Dr. Gladys Nieva (Low-Temperature Division, Centro Atómico Bariloche).
de la Cruz did not follow a standard path to academia, but this has not stopped him from achieving a successful career in physics. In addition to the usual challenges faced by budding scientists, geographical isolation, war, and political upheaval have all been roadblocks overcome during his studies and research.
Barcelona to Bariloche
de la Cruz was born in Barcelona, Spain, in 1938, in the middle of the Spanish Civil War. “My mother was a schoolteacher. She was forbidden to teach after Franco became the head of the state in Spain,” says de la Cruz, “so I never went to primary school, because I was the only one my mother could teach.” She …
