George Robert Carruthers

Infobox Scientist
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birth_date = October 1, 1939
birth_place = Cincinnati, Ohio
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nationality = United States
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field = physics
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prizes = Arthur S. Flemming Award (Washington Jaycees), 1970
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George Robert Carruthers ( born October 1, 1939 in Cincinnati, Ohio) is an African American inventor, physicist, and space scientist. He has lived most of his life on the South Side of Chicago.

George Carruthers was born in Cincinnati, Ohio on October 1, 1939 and grew up in South Side, Chicago. His father was a civil engineer and his mother was a homemaker. The family lived in Milford, Ohio until Carruthers' father died suddenly and his mother moved the family back to her native Chicago. At an early age George developed an interest in physics, which his father encouraged. Also as a child, he enjoyed visiting Chicago museums, libraries and the planetarium that caused him to be an avid science-fiction reader and enjoyed constructing model rockets. Later he became a member of the Chicago Rocket Society and various science clubs.

In 1957, he earned his high school diploma from Englewood High School. This was the same year that the Russians launched the first Sputnik. After high school he entered to the College of Engineering at the University of Illinois, getting his bachelor's of science degree in aeronautical engineering in the year of 1961. He also did his graduate work at the University of Illinois earning his masters degree in nuclear engineering in 1962 and his Ph.D. in aeronautical and astronomical engineering. While conducting his graduate studies, Carruthers worked as researcher and teaching assistant studying plasma and gases.

By 1964, Carruthers began employment for the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, D.C. where his work focused on far ultraviolet astronomy. 1969 was the year he received a patent for his invention, the "Image Converter," which detected electromagnetic radiation in short wave lengths, and in 1970, he made the first examination of molecular hydrogen in space. Two years later, Carruthers invented the first moon-based observatory, the Far Ultraviolet Camera/ Spectrograph, which was used in the Apollo 16 mission. During the 1980s, Carruthers helped create a program called the Science & Engineers Apprentice Program, which allows high school students to spend a summer working with scientists at the Naval Research Laboratory. Later on in 1986, one of Carruthers' inventions captured an ultraviolet image of Halley's Comet. In 1991, he invented a camera that was used in the Space Shuttle Mission. During the summers of 1996 and 1997 he taught a course in Earth and Space Science for D.C. Public Schools Science teachers. He also helped develop a series of videotapes on Earth and Space science for high school students.

Since 1983 he has been Chairman of the Editing and Review Committee and Editor, Journal of the National Technical Association.

Since 2002, Carruthers has been teaching a two-semester course in Earth and Space Science at Howard University sponsored by a NASA Aerospace Workforce Development Grant.

He is a member of the American Astronomical Society, the American Geophysical Union, the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Awards

*Arthur S. Flemming Award (Washington Jaycees), 1970
*Exceptional Achievement Scientific Award Medal NASA 1972
*Warner Prize of the American Astronomical Society
*National Science Foundation Fellow
*Honorary Doctor of Engineering, Michigan Technological University