Kathie Elaine Newman

With great sadness we announce that Kathie Elaine Newman, 73, of Granger, Indiana, died in South Bend, Indiana, at Memorial Hospital on December 31, 2025, of heart failure. 

She was born in Frederick, Maryland, in 1952 to Arthur S. Newman and Jean C. Newman, the third of their four daughters. The family moved to Bethesda, Maryland, where she spent most of her childhood.

She was an undergraduate in physics at Michigan State and obtained her masters and PhD at the University of Washington (Seattle), where she met her future husband, Bruce Bunker. After obtaining her PhD in 1981, she and Bruce both held post-doc research positions at the University of Illinois (Champaign-Urbana). In 1983, Kathie and Bruce started their positions as tenure-track physics professors at the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana. After 5 years they both achieved tenure, and after a 37-year long career they both retired to Emeritus status at the end of 2020.

Kathie taught and advised countless students, both as a professor and as Associate Dean of the College of Science. She was an extraordinary teacher, winning the Notre Dame President’s Award twice, and a pioneer as a female in the male-dominated field of theoretical physics. This allowed her to pursue a range of research interests including the mathematics of semiconductors and exotic phases of ice crystals. She also worked to establish a maternity policy for faculty and staff.

Her interests were expansive; she loved gardening, cooking, hiking, and took some hobbies into mathematical extremes such as sewing Penrose tiles and knitting a Klein bottle. She enjoyed traveling broadly worldwide and had visited nearly every continent. She was extraordinarily well-read, having immersed herself in thousands of books. She was in multiple book clubs and always had a recommendation.

Kathie is survived by her loving husband Bruce Bunker, sons Ian and Eric Bunker, daughter-in-law Clara, grandsons Otis, Finn, and Hobbes, sisters Barbara, Janice, and Andrea, nephews Tom, Dan, Carl, and Nathan, niece Linnea, and siblings-in-law Adrienne, Grant, John, and Wayne.

Kathie was a fiercely intelligent, kind, warm, pragmatic, and sensitive soul who touched countless lives in her time on Earth. She will be greatly missed.

A memorial service will be held at the Unitarian Universalist Church of South Bend (801 E. Washington St. South Bend, Indiana) January 17, 2026 at 1pm.

In lieu of flowers, donations to Habitat for Humanity (Habitat for Humanity) or Oxfam International (Ways to Give | Donate Now | Oxfam) would be greatly appreciated.

Palmer Funeral Home, Hickey Chapel is assisting the family with arrangements.

Online condolences may be left for the family at www.Palmerfuneralhomes.com

To send flowers to the family, please visit our floral store.