(1915 – 2015)

Electrical engineer, physicist. ‘Semiconductor and magneto-optics pioneer’.

In 1955, he realized that the creation of continuous and stabile magnetic fields of the order of 250,000 gausses or more would open up an entirely new area of research into basic physics. For this purpose, the Francis Bitter National Magnetic Laboratories in (MIT) was built, after he and his colleagues had convinced the Air Force to do so. In 1960, he became its director. He was instrumental in starting the semiconductor laser effort at Lincoln Laboratories. Lax pioneered the important phenomenon of cyclotron resonance in semiconductors. He then extended these techniques to high magnetic fields (MR) and to the infrared and opened up a new field of modern magneto-optics in semiconductors and semi-metals.

Invented: radar height finder, radar meteorology.

Credited with: ‘fundamental contributions to microwave and IR spectroscopy of semiconductors’.