Francis Wheeler Loomis (August 4, 1889 – February 9, 1976), born in Parkersburg, West Virginia, was an American scientist most widely known for his contributions in the field of physics. Loomis received his undergraduate degree and, in 1917, his PhD from

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of highe ...

. His thesis was on

thermodynamic Thermodynamics is a branch of physics that deals with heat, work, and temperature, and their relation to energy, entropy, and the physical properties of matter and radiation. The behavior of these quantities is governed by the four laws of ...

measurements of mercury.Francis Wheeler Loomis
UIUC Physics, Retrieved on June 24, 2007 Loomis was a

Guggenheim Fellow Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the ar ...

in 1928 studying abroad at Zürich and Göttingen. In 1929, Loomis came to the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign to become the head of the Department of Physics, a position he would retain until 1957. Loomis was challenged in bringing top-notch physics talent to a university in the rural Midwest. When approached by Loomis to join his staff,

Isidor Isaac Rabi Isidor Isaac Rabi (; born Israel Isaac Rabi, July 29, 1898 – January 11, 1988) was an American physicist who won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1944 for his discovery of nuclear magnetic resonance, which is used in magnetic resonance ima ...

stated bluntly "I love subways and I hate cows." While building the department, Loomis attracted two-time Nobel recipient

John Bardeen John Bardeen (; May 23, 1908 – January 30, 1991) was an American physicist and engineer. He is the only person to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics twice: first in 1956 with William Shockley and Walter Brattain for the invention of the tra ...

to join the staff, and had 1955 Nobel Prize winner Polykarp Kusch as a graduate student. Loomis was elected president of the

American Physical Society The American Physical Society (APS) is a not-for-profit membership organization of professionals in physics and related disciplines, comprising nearly fifty divisions, sections, and other units. Its mission is the advancement and diffusion of k ...

and a member of the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the Nat ...

in 1949. In World War I, Loomis served at the

Aberdeen proving ground Aberdeen Proving Ground (APG) (sometimes erroneously called Aberdeen Proving ''Grounds'') is a U.S. Army facility located adjacent to Aberdeen, Harford County, Maryland, United States. More than 7,500 civilians and 5,000 military personnel work a ...

, where he was an Army Ordnance captain. During World War II, he was the associate head of the

MIT Radiation Laboratory The Radiation Laboratory, commonly called the Rad Lab, was a microwave and radar research laboratory located at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It was first created in October 1940 and operated until 31 ...

supporting the national defense and served a two-year period as the organizer of the

MIT Lincoln Laboratory The MIT Lincoln Laboratory, located in Lexington, Massachusetts, is a United States Department of Defense federally funded research and development center chartered to apply advanced technology to problems of national security. Research and dev ...

. The interruption of the war also required Loomis to restart his building of the physics department as two-thirds of the faculty he added in the 1930s moved elsewhere due to the many defense projects related to the war.Hoddeson, Lillian, True Genius:The Life and Science of John Bardeen, page 171, Joseph Henry Press. Loomis founded the Control Systems Laboratory as a research center for national defense purposes during the

Korean War {{Infobox military conflict , conflict = Korean War , partof = the Cold War and the Korean conflict , image = Korean War Montage 2.png , image_size = 300px , caption = Clockwise from top:{ ...

. After the war ended and the work done there became unclassified, the facility was renamed the Coordinated Science Laboratory. At the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign the main physics building was renamed the Loomis Laboratory of Physics posthumously in his honor.

References

External links

National Academy of Sciences Biographical MemoirF. Wheeler Loomis Papers, 1920–1976 at U. of Illinois Archives
{{DEFAULTSORT:Loomis, Francis Wheeler 1889 births 1976 deaths Harvard University alumni University of Göttingen alumni University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign faculty 20th-century American physicists People from Parkersburg, West Virginia Scientists from West Virginia MIT Lincoln Laboratory people Fellows of the American Physical Society Presidents of the American Physical Society