Arthur Leonard Schawlow

Infobox Scientist
name = Arthur Leonard Schawlow


imagesize = 160px
caption = Arthur Leonard Schawlow
birth_date = birth date|1921|5|5|mf=y
birth_place = Mount Vernon, New York
death_date = death date and age|1999|4|28|1921|5|5
death_place = Palo Alto, California
nationality = United States
field = Physics
work_institutions = Bell Labs and Stanford University
alma_mater = University of Toronto
doctoral_advisor = Malcolm Crawford
doctoral_students =
known_for = laser spectroscopy
prizes = Nobel Prize for Physics (1981)
religion = Methodist

Arthur Leonard Schawlow (May 5, 1921 – April 28, 1999) was an American physicist. He is best remembered for his work on lasers, for which he was awarded a 1981 Nobel Prize.

Biography

His mother, Helen Mason, was from Canada and his father, Arthur Schawlow, was an immigrant from Latvia. When Arthur was three years old, they moved to Toronto, Canada.

At the age of 16 he completed high school and received a scholarship in science at the University of Toronto. After earning his undergraduate degree Schawlow continued in graduate school at the University of Toronto which was interrupted due to World War II. At the end of the war he began work on his Ph.D at U of T with Professor Malcolm Crawford. He then took a postdoctoral position with Charles Townes at the physics department of Columbia University in the fall of 1949.

In 1951 he married Aurelia Townes, younger sister to Charles Townes, and together they had three children; Arthur Jr., Helen, and Edith. Arthur Jr. was autistic, with very little speech ability. He considered himself to be an orthodox Protestant Christian and attended a Methodist Church. [http://www.adherents.com/people/ps/Arthur_Schawlow.html]

He went on to accepted a position at Bell Labs in late 1951. He left in 1961 to join the faculty at Stanford University as a professor. He remained until he retired to emeritus status in 1996.

Schawlow and Professor Robert Hofstadter at Stanford, who also had an autistic child, teamed up to help each other find solutions to the condition. Arthur Jr. was put in a special center for autistic individuals, and later Schawlow put together an institution to care for people with autism in Paradise, California. It was later named the Arthur Schawlow Center in 1999, shortly before his death.

Schawlow was a promoter of the controversial method of facilitated communication with patients of autism. [http://news-service.stanford.edu/news/1999/may5/schawlowobit-55.html] [http://suedweb.syr.edu/thefci/2-1sch.htm]

Although his research focused on optics, in particular, lasers and their use in spectroscopy, he also pursued investigations in the areas of superconductivity and nuclear resonance. Schawlow shared the 1981 Nobel Prize in Physics with Nicolaas Bloembergen and Kai Siegbahn for their contributions to the development of laser spectroscopy.

Schawlow coauthored "Microwave Spectroscopy" (1955) with Charles Townes. Also with Townes, they prepared a much disputed, by Gordon Gould, laser patent filed by Bell Labs in 1958.

In 1991 the NEC Corporation and the American Physical Society established a prize: the Arthur L. Schawlow Prize in Laser Science. The prize is awarded annually to "candidates who have made outstanding contributions to basic research using lasers."

Schawlow was born in Mount Vernon, New York and died of leukemia in Palo Alto, California.He is survived by Cleo and Thomasina Johnson and Andy, Rachel, and Colin Dwan.

Awards

* 1963 - Young Medal and Prize, for distinguished research in the field of optics presented by the Institute of physics
* 1981 - Nobel Prize for Physics

cience and Religion

He has participated in science and religion discussions. Regarding God, he stated "I find a need for God in the universe and in my own life." [ page 105 of cite book | author=Margenau, H. | year=1992 | title=Cosmos, Bios, Theos: Scientists Reflect on Science, God, and the Origins of the Universe, Life, and Homo sapiens | publisher=Open Court Publishing Company co-edited with Roy Abraham Varghese. This book is mentioned in a December 28, 1992 Time magazine article: [http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,977352-1,00.html Galileo And Other Faithful Scientists] ]

Bibliography

*Citation
id = PMID:10150635
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10150635
last=Schawlow
first=A L
publication-date=1995 Jun
year=1995
title=Principles of lasers.
volume=13
issue=3
periodical=Journal of clinical laser medicine & surgery
pages=127-30
*Citation
id = PMID:17739964
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17739964
last=Schawlow
first=
publication-date=1982 Jul 2
year=1982
title=Spectroscopy in a New Light.
volume=217
issue=4554
periodical=Science
pages=9-16
doi = 10.1126/science.217.4554.9
*Citation
id = PMID:17801904
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17801904
last=Schawlow
first=
publication-date=1978 Oct 13
year=1978
title=Laser Spectroscopy of Atoms and Molecules.
volume=202
issue=4364
periodical=
pages=141-147
doi = 10.1126/science.202.4364.141
*Citation
id = PMID:5273948
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/5273948
last=McCaul
first=B W
last2=Schawlow
first2=A L
publication-date=1969 Feb 10
year=1969
title=Plasma refractive effects in HCN lasers.
volume=168
issue=3
periodical=Ann. N. Y. Acad. Sci.
pages=697-702
*Citation
id = PMID:5958291
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/5958291
last=Schawlow
first=A L
publication-date=1966
year=1966
title=Lasers.
volume=6
issue=2
periodical=International ophthalmology clinics
pages=241-51

External links

* [http://www.nap.edu/readingroom/books/biomems/aschawlow.html National Academy of Sciences biography]
* [http://www.nobel-winners.com/Physics/arthur_leonard_schawlow.html Nobel Winner: Arthur Leonard Schawlow]
* [http://buzyall.narod.ru/eto/schawlow-press.html Press Release: The 1981 Nobel Prize in Physics]
* [http://news-service.stanford.edu/news/1999/may5/schawlowobit-55-a.html Arthur Leonard Schawlow obituary]

Persondata
NAME=Schawlow, Arthur Leonard
ALTERNATIVE NAMES=
SHORT DESCRIPTION=American physicist
DATE OF BIRTH=May 5, 1921
PLACE OF BIRTH=Mount Vernon, New York
DATE OF DEATH=April 28, 1999
PLACE OF DEATH=Palo Alto, California