Michael Burns is currently the Associate Director for Science, a position he has held since the Rowland Institute for Science merged with Harvard University in 2002, with one year long period when he was Acting Director while the Director served as a temporary Dean at Harvard. Prior to that time he was the Director of Research and Vice President of Rowland’s Board of Directors. He is in charge of the Rowland Junior Fellows program which is the main focus of the Rowland Institute and which provides full support for five years to new Ph.D.s in the research area of their choice. The program supports independent study in all fields of experimental science. His primary long-term scientific interest has been in Optical Matter: he was an author of the paper that introduced that term and concept, in addition to receiving a patent for it. He recently completed a project concerning electro-migration in single crystal copper whiskers and collaborates extensively with Junior and Senior Fellows at Rowland, including projects characterizing complex order in small atomic silver clusters and active electronic control of single molecule DNA dynamics in an organic nano-pore, and lately on bubble nucleation in superheated water.