David Gordon Wilson

For other people named David Wilson, see David Wilson (disambiguation).

David Gordon Wilson outside his home workshop, 2005

David Gordon Wilson is emeritus professor of engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).^[1]

Born in Warwickshire, England, Wilson came to the U.S. on a post-doctoral fellowship in 1955. He returned to Britain in 1957 to work in the gas-turbine industry. He taught engineering in Nigeria from 1958 - 60. He started a branch of a US company in London and in 1961 was moved to the US. In 1966 he joined the MIT faculty and taught engineering design and pursued a long-standing interest into human-powered transport, coauthoring Bicycling Science. He is credited, along with Chester Kyle, with starting the modern recumbent bicycle movement in the USA.

One of the most famous^{[citation needed]} recumbent bicycles, the Avatar 2000 was designed by Wilson and Richard Forrestall in 1980. Tim Gartside (Australia) rode it as the Avatar Bluebell (UK) to a world record (51.9 mile/h) in the US in 1982.

Wilson is the co-founder of Wilson Turbo Power Inc., which was founded in 2001 to commercialize two breakthrough energy technologies developed at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).^[2]

Wilson is the inventor of the 'Wilson Turbogenerator' which is currently being developed. An electrical efficiency of greater than 50% is claimed for his design. A prototype 300 kW microturbine was under development in 2008 when work was terminated and Wilson was removed from the board and, later, from his company.

Notable Publications

• Wilson, David Gordon; Whitt, Frank Rowland et al. (April 2004). Bicycling Science (3rd (paperback) ed.). Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press. ISBN 978-0262731546. http://www.amazon.com/Bicycling-Science-David-Gordon-Wilson/dp/0262731541/ref=sr_1_1. Retrieved 2010-04-15. 
• Wilson, David Gordon; Korakianitis, Theodosios (January 1998). Design of High-Efficiency Turbomachinery and Gas Turbines, The (2nd (paperback) ed.). Prentice Hall. ISBN 978-0133120004. http://www.amazon.com/Design-High-Efficiency-Turbomachinery-Gas-Turbines/dp/0133120007/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpi_2. Retrieved 2010-06-21. 
• Beck, Douglas; Wilson, David Gordon (January 1996). Gas-Turbine Regenerators (hardcover ed.). Springer. ISBN 978-0412983313. http://www.amazon.com/Gas-Turbine-Regenerators-Douglas-Beck/dp/0412983311/ref=sr_1_1/002-8251432-9620827?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1182202566&sr=1-1. Retrieved 2010-09-05. 

References

1. ^ "MIT MechE - David Gordon Wilson". http://meche.mit.edu/people/index.html?id=98. Retrieved 5 September 2010. 
2. ^ "Wilson Solarpower" http://www.wilsonturbopower.com/index.php/company.html. Retrieved 5 September 2010 

External links

• Wilson Turbogenerator at NREL

Persondata
Name	Wilson, David Gordon
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	1928, February 11
Place of birth	UK, Warwickshire, Sutton Coldfield
Date of death	Not yet arranged
Place of death