Donald M. Mattox

Donald M. Mattox

Don obtained his B.S. degree in Physics from Eastern Kentucky State University in 1953. He served as a Lieutenant in the USAF during and after the Korean War. After being discharged from the service he obtained his M.S. degree in Solid State Physics from the University of Kentucky in 1959 and went to work for Sandia Corporation (later Sandia National Laboratories) in 1961. Don retired from Sandia National Laboratories in 1989 after 28 years as a Member of the Technical Staff and then as a Technical Supervisor. At retirement he was Supervisor of the Surface and Interface Technology Division. He has had more than 45 years experience in research, development, application, and production of thin films and coatings prepared by PVD processes as well as other techniques such as electrodepostion, CVD and thermal spraying. In addition he has had extensive experience in many other phases of material science in that he has supervised persons involved in research, development, and application of organic materials, adhesive bonding, ceramic and glass fabrication, ceramic metallizing, surface chemical analytical techniques, tribology, and failure analysis. He has had expensive experience in transferring technology from R&D into production, instructing engineering and production personnel, and in "troubleshooting" production problems. He has published more than 100 papers and book chapters on the subject of PVD processing and other coating processes. Don was President of the American Vacuum Society (AVS) in 1985. In 1988, the 9th International Congress on Vacuum Metallurgy presented him with an award for "outstanding contributions to metallurgical coating technology for the period 1961-1988" and in 1995 he was the recipient of the AVS Albert Nerken Award for his work in the development of the ion plating process and also became a Fellow of the AVS. In 2007 Don received the Nat Sugerman Award from the Society of Vacuum Coaters. At present he is a consultant in the field of PVD processing with Management Plus, Inc. of Albuquerque, NM. Don was the Technical Director of the Society of Vacuum Coaters, from 1989 to 2006. Don has written numerous papers book chapters including Educational Guides to Vacuum Coating Processing (2009) (ISBN 978-1-878068-28-6) published by the Society of Vacuum Coaters Handbook of Physical Vapor Deposition (PVD) Processing (1998) (ISBN 0-8155-1422-0) (2nd edition published in 2010 ISBN #978-0-81-552037-5) and The Foundations of Vacuum Coating Technologies (2003) (ISBN 0-8155-1495-6) all published by Elsevier Ltd./William Andrew Publishing/Noyes Publications. Don is the editor of the Annual Proceedings of the SVC Technical Conference (ISSN 0737-5921), SVC Bulletin, and he along with Vivienne Harwood Mattox edited the book 50 Years of Vacuum Coating Technology and the Growth of the Society of Vacuum Coaters published by the Society of Vacuum Coaters (2007) (ISBN 978-1-878068-27-9).