On behalf of the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR), please let me extend my sincere and deepest condolences in respect of untimely demise of Dr. Gerardo Dutto, an outstanding researcher and scientific administrator. It is with deep sorrow that we have learned this grave news.
Over his longstanding involvement in research work in the field of accelerator technologies, he greatly contributed to the development of beneficial scientific and technical collaboration all around the world.
Please convey my respects and heartfelt condolences to the family members and friends of Dr. Gerardo Dutto.
Sincerely yours,
Boris N. Gikal,
Chief Engineer of the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research
With great sorrow I heard that Gerardo passed away.
He was a great personal friend of mine.
Gerardo started his job at TRIUMF in 1971, just 3 months before I arrived for my sabbatical two years.
Immediately he made some important improvements to the design of the cyclotron:
1. He changed the injection position for the 300 keV beam, allowing a good beam centering for a wide phase range.
2. He introcuded vertical deflection plates to compensate misalignments in the RF structure.
Later as chief of the whole accelerator system he made sure, that the operation of the cyclotron was reliable, and he took special care, that his staff was highly motivated.
As former chairman of the TRIUMF Machine Advisory Committe I could see with joy, that with constant improvements the design goal of the beam current was easily surpassed.
Even after Gerardo’s retirement in 2003 I was in frequent contact with him.
Due to Gerardo’s initiative we spent in 2007 some wonderful days in Beijing, consulting the Chinese Institute for Atomic Energy
during construction of their 100 MeV cyclotron.
With great sadness I registered that Gerardo started to loose his memory.
I contacted Gerardo and his wife Ludka regularly around Christmas and his birthdays.
Gerardo’s death leaves a great scar in my heart .
My deep condolences go to Gerardo’s wife Ludka and his children Lorenzo and Daniela.
Werner Joho
PSI
Gerardo came to TRIUMF in December 1970 as a PDF from Milan where he had just earned his PhD degree. He first worked with me on the Centre Region Cyclotron where he provided beam dynamics support and in particular the design of the correction plates for vertical centring of the beam – they were first called “Dutto “ plates.
Then when Erich Vogt took over as director in 1981 he set up the Division Heads management system and Gerardo became the Division head for Cyclotron Division. Dave Axen for Science , Mike Craddock for Accelerator Research and myself for Experimental Facilities .
Very sorry to hear about Gerardo but I know he was not enjoying life,
Ewart Blackmore
TRIUMF
Here in Catania all the colleagues that known Gerardo are distressed and saddened to learn of His death.
I feel that his loss will be keenly felt by all of those who had the privilege of know him.
Sincerely yours,
Luciano Calabretta on behalf of LNS Staff
I worked with Gerardo for many years. It was so sad to hear that he had passed away. He was absolutely dedicated to TRIUMF, and his extensive knowledge and powerful personality provided a unique strength to every assignment that he took on. Everyone knew that if Gerardo was involved, he would make sure that the project was a success.
Gerardo was a gracious ambassador for TRIUMF, who was recognized and welcomed in many countries.
He was a tremendous colleague, and an outstanding person. It is an honour to have known him.
Phil Gardner
I first met Gerardo around 20 years ago, when he came to Berlin. He impressed me not only by his knowledge about cyclotrons, but about history and politics as well. He was so much involved in the development of cyclotrons.
He was really very attentive for wishes of his conversational partners, taking care for their ideas: when we visited him in Vancouver in 2002 and heard that we liked sailing, he immediately arranged for a fantastic sailing trip on the central Howe sound.
Please accept my sympathy and offer my sincere condolations to the family.
Best wishes
Andrea Denker
Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin für Materialien und Energie GmbH
I am very sorrowful to hear this sad news from you. On behalf of IMP, Prof. Baowen Wei and Prof. Wenlong Zhan, I would like to express our condolences to Dr.Gerardo Dutto's passing away. His passing away is a great loss to our international cyclotron community. Gerardo achieved a lot for cyclotron development. He ever visited IMP/Lanzhou a few times and promoted collaboration between IMP and TRIUMF.
Please send our condolences and greetings to his family and friends.
Sincerely yours,
Hongwei Zhao
Institute of Modern Physics, Lanzhou China
May he rest in peace.
Our deepest condolences go to Gerardo’s family.
Amen.
Warmest wishes always,
Damien Gallop
I am deeply saddened to hear of the loss of Dr.Gerardo Dutto.
Words cannot even begin to express my sorrow.
I will say though, Gerardo will always be in my heart.
He was a truly great leader of the Cyclotron Division at TRIUMF.
I will always cherish the memories that I am privileged to have of him.
Please convey my sincerest condolences to his family and all at TRIUMF.
Sincerely yours,
Yoshiharu Mori
Kyoto University
He was a good friend of mine and I knew him well.
Please keep me informed of any celebration for him.
I would love to attend if possible.
Thanks again.
Doris Joseph
I heard from my Italian colleague that a few days ago Gerardo DUTTO, former director of the Triumf cyclotron, and one of the most distinctive characters of the first pioneering epoch of your laboratory, passed away.
I was linked to Gerardo since my first part of my career was in the cyclotron group of the University of Milano. He was already gone form Milano since long time when I started in 1980, moving to Triumf when the laboratory was formed. But his memory in Milano was lively, so I heard a lot of story. And then I met him at cyclotron conference and eventually he invited me to pass three months at TRIUNF, to work of the very first TR30, the new generation of medical isotope cyclotron that Triumf was just launching at the time (1989!).
So let me express my vicinity to your Laboratory for this lost, and please pass my condolence to you Director. Despite Gerardo was retired since long, he is certainly remembered as one of the man that made this laboratory and has provided a foundation for the subsequent projects and the expansion into new adventures (among them of course the HiLumi LHC one!).
My best regards,
Lucio Rossi
CERN ATS/DO
Gerardo was a great leader and friend. We will miss and remember him.
Anatoli Zelenski
BNL
This morning I get a very sad new about Gerardo coming from CERN people.
May I have something more from you ? How may the italian friends share their condolence with the family and the colleagues at Triumf ?
Sorry, me and my family are very distraught in this moment.
Regards
Dario Giove
INFN
Here, at CIAE, we are saddened to learn of the passing of Dr. Gerardo Dutto, it is with the deepest grief that we pay great respects to the memory of him.He is praised as one of the most illustrious scientist in cyclotrons and their applications. For decades, it has played a huge role in many cyclotrons design and construction for Canada, Italy, and China as well.
Dr. Gerardo Dutto has made important contributions to the development of high intensity cyclotron technology in China and the construction of 100 MeV compact cyclotron projects at CIAE, which influence is widespread and long-term. Around 2000, CIAE started to design a 100 MeV compact cyclotron CYCIAE-100. This is the first time we have developed such a high intensity compact cyclotron with energy up to 100 MeV.
Since then, Dr. Gerardo Dutto had visited CIAE in person year by year to introduce his experience to CIAE's cyclotron team and supervised our young researchers for the cyclotron development. And according to the needs of the design and construction, he also timely recommended and helped to invite the cyclotron experts from TRIUMF, PSI, INFN and GANIL etc. to visit Beijing and have cooperative research. More importantly, he helped us to organize two technical meetings of cyclotron experts in Tokyo in 2004 and Sicily in 2007 to discuss problems in the design and construction of CYCIAE-100. Our cyclotron successfully extracted the first proton beam in 2014 and achieved 520μA on the beam dump in 2018, which is inseparable from his original help.
He also comprehensively promoted the technical collaboration between TRIUMF and CIAE for more than 15 years. The collaboration for the past years has proved to be very productive in many aspects, especially in the field of Accelerator Science and Technology. The mutual exchange of personnel within the framework of the collaboration has taken place. According to available statistics, the visitors including: Gerardo Dutto, Igor Sekachev, Ken Fong, George Mackenzie, Mike Craddock, Qiwen Zheng, Shuyao Fang, Tom Kuo, Dick Yuan, Paul Schmor, Alan Shotter, Bruce Milton, Yi-Nong Rao, Yuri Bylinski, Robert Laxdal, Michael Laverty, Richard Baartman, Nigel Lockyer, Jonathan Bagger, etc. from TRIUMF and, Tianjue Zhang, Chengjie Chu, Hongjuan Yao, Yinlong Lv, Bin Ji, Sumin Wei, Zhenguo Li, Jiansheng Xing, GaofengPan, Fang Yan, Zhiguo Yin, Xianlu Jia, Yanyun Ma, Xiaoliang Fu, Baoqun Cui, Weiping Liu, etc. from CIAE.
Dr. Garardo Dutto was awarded “Friendship Award” in 2015, which is the upmost prize set by Chinese government for foreign experts who has made great contribution during Chinese cause of modernization and reform and opening up. This is the most top Chinese national-level prize for foreign experts for their contributions of the country. The premier and vice premier of the State Council presented at this awarding ceremony and exchanged ideas with the awarded scientists, every year. However, Dr. Dutto was absent at this awarding ceremony at the Great Hall of the People in October 2015 for his health reason.
Consul General of PR China in Vancouver Madame Liu Fei awarded the prize on behalf of Chinese government to Dr. Dutto and his family in the Coast Bastion Hotel in Nanaimo, on April 20, 2016. I, on behalf of CIAE and Prof. Bagger, on behalf of TRIUMF attended the event and share a pleasant reward for our continuing cooperation in the past years.
I here that: feel good when somebody miss you, feel better when somebody loves you, but feel best when somebody never forgets you. We mourn and miss Dr. Dutto. He may be out of our sight, but not out of our mind; He may be out of our reach, but not out of our heart. At this moment, and forever, let's remember Dr. Gerardo Dutto's contribution to the cyclotron Community.
Yours sincerely
Tianjue Zhang
Research Center for Cyclotron at China Institute of Atomic Energy
With the passing away of Gerardo Dutto TRIUMF and the cyclotron community have lost an eminent cyclotron physicist, engineer and manager and above all dear colleague and friend. Gerardo has contributed to the development of cyclotrons and their applications over a period of more than four decades, initially in Milano and subsequently for many years at TRIUMF, as is witnessed by his many contributions at the cyclotron conference since 1966. In particular his contribution to the development of high power cyclotrons for medical isotope production, key to the strong development of molecular imaging as a diagnostic tool in medicine, is hard to overrate from a societal perspective.
My personal interaction with Gerardo started at the 1989 Cyclotron Conference in Berlin, the first one I attended after entering the cyclotron community; in all respects an impressive person with deep and broad knowledge that he was very happy to share with the newcomer I was at that time. Over the years I had many fruitful and pleasant discussions with Gerardo on many subjects at the various places where we met, planned or accidentally. I have very much appreciated his hospitality during the visits I paid to TRIUMF, arranging excursions to the marvellous nature surrounding Vancouver and sailing trips as well as excellent food.
Best regards,
Sytze Brandenburg
KVI-Center for Advanced Radiation Technology
University of Groningen
the Netherlands
It is very sad to read Gerardo Dutto has passed away.
I have known Gerardo as a very nice person. He had a thorough knowledge on may practical aspects of cyclotron manufacturing and operation. Although he was clearly the expert, he has always remained a person who showed big interest on what other, less experienced, persons were doing and was always prepared to discuss any cyclotron related topic.
I have enjoyed various of these, sometimes quite intensive discussions and greatly have appreciated his interest in my work on the medical cyclotron at PSI.
I will never forget, that, even after his retirement, he picked me up at the airport every time I visited TRIUMF. Then he first had a meal and a beer with me in a nearby restaurant. Although I was usually quite tired due to the jetlag, I have always experienced this as a very warm welcome.
He is one of the TRIUMF-phenomena that I will always have in the back of my mind, when having contact with the colleagues of TRIUMF.
Although I am quite late, since I have missed your email somehow, I hope you can still forward my condolences to his relatives and former colleagues.
Best regards,
Marco Schippers
PSI