Headshot of Anne McIlroy.Bill Grimshaw
It was an unorthodox plea for employment.
"Please save me from a lucrative career on Wall Street," Howard Burton wrote in the covering letter he sent along with his CV to Mike Lazaridis, co-chief executive officer of the Waterloo, Ont.-based wireless communication company Research In Motion.
It was 1999, and Mr. Burton had finished his doctorate in physics at the University of Waterloo and was reluctantly planning to move to Manhattan for an entry-level position programming financial algorithms. Mr. Lazaridis, whose company makes the wildly popular BlackBerry, had been thinking hard about the future of physics. The entrepreneur and philanthropist was ready to commit $100-million to a lofty scientific venture.
There was something about the 34-year-old Mr. Burton that appealed to Mr. Lazaridis, so he hired him to help set up what would become the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, in Waterloo.
A decade later, it is a destination for top physicists from around the world, including Stephen Hawking, who is coming for a stint this summer. Its impressive roster of 85 researchers, plus a constant influx of visiting scientists, is tackling some of the biggest fundamental questions in science, including why the expansion of the universe seems to be accelerating, and how
all the particles and forces of nature are interrelated.
Mr. Burton's new book, First Principles: The Crazy Business of Doing Serious Science, published by Key Porter and available April 24, is an account of how the Perimeter Institute was built from scratch; how he and his colleagues recruited stars and up-and-comers with a mixture of specialties, oversaw the construction of a striking modern building, lobbied the federal government to contribute millions and reached out to bring physics to the local community.
MONTY PYTHON MOMENTS
As a recent graduate, Mr. Burton admits he was out of the league of the physicists he needed to recruit or enlist for advice. He describes feeling overwhelmed and unsure of himself before approaching prominent scientists such as Britain's Sir Roger Penrose. His morale received a boost when Dr. Penrose, who has pondered questions as difficult as how fundamental physics affects human consciousness, couldn't find the telephone in his study for a conference call as they prepared for a meeting.
"This was not a wireless phone, you understand, but an old-fashioned, beige British Telecom phone at least 25 years old that had doubtless never left the study, but it seemed to have escaped somehow," Mr. Burton writes.
"Where was Vanessa, Roger's wife? She could find the phone. But Vanessa was nowhere to be found - out taking Max, their young son, for a stroll in the pram. But wait! Here was the phone - hidden under a mass of paper and books."
Once they found it, it took a while to figure out where to plug it in.
"Here I was, having a meeting with four of the smartest people on the planet about a physics institute that had been launched on the success of a wireless technology company and we were stymied by the prospect of operating a telephone.
"I started to relax and enjoy the moment. I'm no Roger Penrose, but in my house, at least, the phone is regularly plugged in, and calling overseas is generally not regarded as logistically equal to launching the space shuttle."
Finding the phone was the first of many hurdles. Attracting elite physicists with good jobs at established institutions wasn't easy.
Mr. Burton and his colleagues pitched Perimeter as place where theorists could do their best work because they could interact with other brilliant but independent thinkers, including the brightest young researchers starting their careers and a steady flow of visiting researchers to keep things fresh. Other enticements included good salaries, job security and all the amenities - espresso machines, fireplaces, good food - that would allow someone to comfortably work 14-to-16-hour days if they were on to something.
Early on, they decided to keep the new institute separate from the University of Waterloo, where Mr. Lazaridis had studied engineering but dropped out in 1984 just shy of graduation to start RIM.
University administrations, Mr. Burton writes, "tend to be replete with people who are often reasonably accomplished in their own narrow line of research but generally lack any sense of strategic or tactical sense, boldness, objectivity, candour, breadth, judgment, management skills, political instinct, financial awareness or, quite frankly, personality."
He and Mr. Lazaridis also attempted to break down the barricades that had been erected between several subdisciplines of physics, to bring together researchers with different ideas. They went after a mix of big-picture types, conceptual thinkers who often question key assumptions, and those whose work is devoted more to very technical, detailed calculations.
Their hires came from outrider territory in theoretical physics, as well as the more established fields of string theory and cosmology.
The result, says Nima Arkani-Hamed, a theoretical high-energy physicist at Princeton's Institute for Advanced Study, is impressive. Perimeter is the indisputable leader in loop quantum gravity, a way of trying to put together the laws of quantum mechanics and general relativity. But it is also very strong in more mainstream fields such as string theory and cosmology, he says.
"When the thing started, everyone had a wait-and-see attitude about how it would all work out. But it is already a magnet for the very top theoretical physicists in the world," says Dr. Arkani-Hamed, who grew up in Toronto and last year left a position at Harvard. He occasionally visits PI and, like Prof. Hawking, is a distinguished research chair.
He says he is thrilled that Canada now has a place where physicists can focus on research that doesn't have obvious applications, an environ-
ment where they can take on a set of hard problems that will be solved only with a concentrated effort over a long period of time.
"What remains to be seen is if some really spectacular breakthrough will come of it. We don't have one yet, but I suspect that the pieces are in place and something great could happen."
COMMUNICATION BREAKDOWN
Not bad for a place that was an ambitious but vague idea a decade ago, when Mr. Burton landed his dream assignment. He is no longer part of it, however. In telling the remarkable story of how the Perimeter Institute came to be, its founding executive director may have written himself out of a job.
In an interview, Mr. Burton said the fact he was planning to publish caused a rift with Mr. Lazaridis. "It was seen as a threat to the institute. This led to a breakdown in communications and a serious breakdown with the personalities involved, namely me and Mike."
In 2007, his contract was not renewed and he left the institute. Now 44, he is living in France and working as a writer and a consultant.
Most of the book, written while he was still employed by the Perimeter Institute, offers glowing descriptions of Mr. Lazaridis as a thoughtful, shrewd, generous and decent man.
Even in the epilogue, composed after he lost his job, Mr. Burton is careful with his words, and writes that he tried to be as respectful as possible. "This is, as it happens, not terribly difficult: Mike Lazaridis launched a remarkable philanthropic foray for basic science, setting a global standard that still resonates around the world."
While the tone of the book is overwhelmingly positive, First Principles could be seen as self-aggrandizing on the part of the author, perhaps at the expense of others involved in the venture, including Mr. Lazaridis.
For example, Mr. Burton describes how he went for a walk along the shore of Lake Ontario in Toronto after he received his first paycheque and came up with name for the institute.
"Okay then, I thought to myself, we were different, a bit on the edge, trying to challenge the limits of the establishment, of orthodoxy - indeed, hopefully, of human knowledge itself. And so naturally I began to think of related words: edge, boundary, perimeter. Hmmm, Perimeter Institute - that could be interesting, I quickly realized, on several levels."
He e-mailed Mr. Lazaridis, who used his BlackBerry to respond: "Sounds good."
So, Mr. Burton writes, "just like that Perimeter Institute was officially born. Not bad for my first afternoon's work, I thought, and retired to the local Starbucks to treat myself to a celebratory cappuccino."
John Matlock, director of external relations and outreach at the Perimeter Institute, said in an e-mail that the non-renewal of Mr. Burton's contract was not linked to the book, and is a private personnel matter he can't discuss.
Many of the views expressed in the book are Mr. Burton's, he said, but he praised the author of First Principles. "Howard was central among many tireless individuals responsible for PI's success during the start-up phase. His passion, personal opinions and uncompromising style marked his tenure at PI."
In his epilogue, Mr. Burton says the conclusion many people have drawn is that "the entire imbroglio was some ab-
surd clash of egos, with Mike and myself vying to take credit for building the institute."
He concedes there may be truth to that interpretation. "It is true that, given my role, I'm naturally convinced Perimeter Institute wouldn't have occurred without me (at least not anywhere near its current shape). It is also overwhelmingly obvious that it wouldn't have occurred without Mike (in any shape)."
After Mr. Burton left, the institute recruited a new director, Neil Turok from Cambridge, a prominent physicist who was able to attract Prof. Hawking and other leading scientists who have accepted appointments as PI distinguished research chairs.
Mr. Lazaridis also donated $50-million more to the venture, increasing his personal contribution to $150-million.
Much has been accomplished, but Mr. Burton argues that there is room for improvement. The federal and Ontario governments, which help to fund the institute, should request a seat on the board of directors, he says.
"I think things were done improperly, and I think a lot of people - myself included, but a lot of other people - were not treated very well. But I don't want to be bitching about Mike or have this coming across as a personality spat. ...
"It is a physics institute. I don't want to turn this into a soap opera."
Anne McIlroy is The Globe and Mail's science writer.