Sir Leslie Harold Martin, (21 December 1900 – 1 February 1983) was an Australian

physicist A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe. Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate cau ...

. He was one of the 24 Founding Fellows of the Australian Academy of Science and had a significant influence on the structure of higher education in Australia as chairman of the Australian Universities Commission from 1959 until 1966. He was Professor of Physics at the

University of Melbourne The University of Melbourne is a public research university located in Melbourne, Australia. Founded in 1853, it is Australia's second oldest university and the oldest in Victoria. Its main campus is located in Parkville, an inner suburb no ...

from 1945 to 1959, and Dean of the Faculty of Military Studies and Professor of Physics at the

University of New South Wales The University of New South Wales (UNSW), also known as UNSW Sydney, is a public research university based in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. It is one of the founding members of Group of Eight, a coalition of Australian research-intensiv ...

at the

Royal Military College, Duntroon lit: Learning promotes strength , established = , type = Military college , chancellor = , head_label = Commandant , head = Brigadier Ana Duncan , principal = , city = Campbell , state ...

, in Canberra from 1967 to 1970. He was the Defence Scientific Adviser and chairman of the Defence Research and Development Policy Committee from 1948 to 1968, and a member of the

Australian Atomic Energy Commission The Australian Atomic Energy Commission (AAEC) was a statutory body of the Australian government. It was established in 1952, replacing the Atomic Energy Policy Committee. In 1981 parts of the Commission were split off to become part of CSIRO, t ...

from 1958 to 1968. In this role he was an official observer at several British

nuclear weapons tests in Australia The United Kingdom conducted 12 major nuclear weapons tests in Australia between 1952 and 1957. These explosions occurred at the Montebello Islands, Emu Field and Maralinga. Sites The British conducted testing in the Pacific Ocean at Malden ...

Early life

Leslie Harold Martin was born in the

Melbourne Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a met ...

suburb of Footscray on 21 December 1900, to Henry Richard Martin, a railway worker, and his wife Esther (Ettie) Emily, née Tutty. He attended Flemington State School and won a Junior State Scholarship to

Melbourne High School Melbourne High School is a government-funded single-sex academically selective secondary day school for boys, located in the Melbourne suburb of South Yarra, Victoria, Australia. Established in 1905, the school caters for boys from Year 9 ...

for his final years of secondary schooling in 1917 and 1918. His mathematics teacher, Miss Julia Flynn, encouraged him, and he won a

Victorian Education Department The Department of Education is a government department in Victoria, Australia. Formerly known as the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development until January 2015 and Department of Education and Training (DET) until January 2023, the ...

Senior Government Scholarship in 1918. He entered the

on the scholarship in 1919, to study for a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University o ...

for Education, with the intention of becoming a maths teacher. In 1921, in his final year, he came top of his year with first class honours in Natural Philosophy (physics) and was awarded the Dixson Scholarship in Natural Philosophy. In 1922, he completed his

Master of Science A Master of Science ( la, Magisterii Scientiae; abbreviated MS, M.S., MSc, M.Sc., SM, S.M., ScM or Sc.M.) is a master's degree in the field of science awarded by universities in many countries or a person holding such a degree. In contrast t ...

degree, writing his master's thesis on "The emission of X Rays" under the supervision of Professor T. H. Laby. He was awarded first class honours and both the Dixson and Kernot Scholarships. Martin was awarded the Fred Knight Research Scholarship in 1923, which allowed him to continue his research with Laby. He earned extra money as a demonstrator in the Department of Natural Philosophy, and he lectured in the evenings at the Working Men's College. Laby nominated him for an

1851 Research Fellowship The 1851 Research Fellowship is a scheme conducted by the Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851 to annually award a three-year research scholarship to approximately eight "young scientists or engineers of exceptional promise". The fellowship ...

and a free trip to England to study physics under

Ernest Rutherford Ernest Rutherford, 1st Baron Rutherford of Nelson, (30 August 1871 – 19 October 1937) was a New Zealand physicist who came to be known as the father of nuclear physics. ''Encyclopædia Britannica'' considers him to be the greatest ...

at the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a public collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209 and granted a royal charter by Henry III in 1231, Cambridge is the world's third oldest surviving university and one of its most pr ...

's Cavendish laboratory. Before departing, he married Gladys Maude Elaine Bull, a

Bachelor of Music Bachelor of Music (BM or BMus) is an academic degree awarded by a college, university, or conservatory upon completion of a program of study in music. In the United States, it is a professional degree, and the majority of work consists of pre ...

student at the University of Melbourne, at St James's Church of England in Ivanhoe on 13 February 1923. She did not complete her studies, but instead accompanied him to England, sailing on the SS ''Berrima''. They had two sons; the first, Leon Henry Martin, born in

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a College town, university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cam ...

on 25 April 1924. When Gladys became pregnant again, she decided to return to Australia to be with her parents. Their second son,

Raymond Leslie Martin Raymond Leslie Martin (3 February 1926 – 25 February 2020) was an Australian chemistry professor and university administrator. He was Vice-Chancellor of Monash University from 1977 to 1987.

Academic career

Martin enrolled at

Trinity College, Cambridge Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at either Cambridge or Oxford. ...

, and continued his research into

X-rays An X-ray, or, much less commonly, X-radiation, is a penetrating form of high-energy electromagnetic radiation. Most X-rays have a wavelength ranging from 10 picometers to 10 nanometers, corresponding to frequencies in the range 30&nbs ...

under Rutherford's supervision. He completed his PhD in 1926. The results of this work were published in the ''

Proceedings of the Royal Society of London ''Proceedings of the Royal Society'' is the main research journal of the Royal Society. The journal began in 1831 and was split into two series in 1905: * Series A: for papers in physical sciences and mathematics. * Series B: for papers in life s ...

'', and the ''

Proceedings of the Cambridge Philosophical Society ''Mathematical Proceedings of the Cambridge Philosophical Society'' is a mathematical journal published by Cambridge University Press for the Cambridge Philosophical Society. It aims to publish original research papers from a wide range of pure ...

''. He was awarded an International Research Fellowship by the Rockefeller Foundation, allowing him to stay on into 1927. He later recalled that: Martin applied for a position as a lecturer at the University of Melbourne in January 1927. He was successful, and returned to Australia in August 1927. His corner of the Cavendish Laboratory was taken over by

Ernest Walton Ernest Thomas Sinton Walton (6 October 1903 – 25 June 1995) was an Irish physicist and Nobel laureate. He is best known for his work with John Cockcroft to construct one of the earliest types of particle accelerator, the Cockcroft–Walton ...

. Martin continued his research into X-rays, working with Laby, J. C. Bower and F. F. H. Eggleston. He won the David Syme Research Prize in 1934, for his investigation of the

Auger effect The Auger effect or Auger−Meitner effect is a physical phenomenon in which the filling of an inner-shell vacancy of an atom is accompanied by the emission of an electron from the same atom. When a core electron is removed, leaving a vacancy, ...

, the emission of electrons after ionisation by X-rays. Work with the

chemical element A chemical element is a species of atoms that have a given number of protons in their nuclei, including the pure substance consisting only of that species. Unlike chemical compounds, chemical elements cannot be broken down into simpler sub ...

xenon Xenon is a chemical element with the symbol Xe and atomic number 54. It is a dense, colorless, odorless noble gas found in Earth's atmosphere in trace amounts. Although generally unreactive, it can undergo a few chemical reactions such as the ...

gave important confirmation of

Paul Dirac Paul Adrien Maurice Dirac (; 8 August 1902 – 20 October 1984) was an English theoretical physicist who is regarded as one of the most significant physicists of the 20th century. He was the Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at the Univer ...

's quantum field theory. In 1937 he became an Associate Professor in

Natural Philosophy Natural philosophy or philosophy of nature (from Latin ''philosophia naturalis'') is the philosophical study of physics, that is, nature and the physical universe. It was dominant before the development of modern science. From the ancient wo ...

, and second-in-charge of the Natural Philosophy Department. With the outbreak of the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

in September 1939, Martin commenced projects at the request of the Australian Defence Forces, investigating a

proximity fuse A proximity fuze (or fuse) is a fuze that detonates an explosive device automatically when the distance to the target becomes smaller than a predetermined value. Proximity fuzes are designed for targets such as planes, missiles, ships at sea, an ...

for the

Australian Army The Australian Army is the principal land warfare force of Australia, a part of the Australian Defence Force (ADF) along with the Royal Australian Navy and the Royal Australian Air Force. The Army is commanded by the Chief of Army (CA), wh ...

and an acoustic communications system for the

Royal Australian Air Force "Through Adversity to the Stars" , colours = , colours_label = , march = , mascot = , anniversaries = RAAF Anniversary Commemoration ...

(RAAF) that would allow an instructor and trainee pilot to converse with each other. He led a team that built a prototype Height and Range Finder No. 3, Mark IV, for the Army, but the Army cancelled the order in August 1941 when the prototype was nearly complete. In January 1942, he was seconded to the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research's Radiophysics Laboratory in Sydney to develop secret valves for a Radio Direction Finder. He teamed up with

Eric Burhop Eric Henry Stoneley Burhop, (31 January 191122 January 1980) was an Australian physicist and humanitarian. A graduate of the University of Melbourne, Burhop was awarded an 1851 Exhibition Scholarship to study at the Cavendish Laboratory under ...

to build a

magnetron The cavity magnetron is a high-power vacuum tube used in early radar systems and currently in microwave ovens and linear particle accelerators. It generates microwaves using the interaction of a stream of electrons with a magnetic field while ...

, producing a working prototype on 23 May 1942. He then went on to build an original magnetron that generated 25 centimetre

microwave Microwave is a form of electromagnetic radiation with wavelengths ranging from about one meter to one millimeter corresponding to frequencies between 300 MHz and 300 GHz respectively. Different sources define different frequency ra ...

radiation. These magnetrons were used in

radar Radar is a detection system that uses radio waves to determine the distance ('' ranging''), angle, and radial velocity of objects relative to the site. It can be used to detect aircraft, ships, spacecraft, guided missiles, motor vehicles, we ...

equipment by the Army, RAAF,

Royal Australian Navy The Royal Australian Navy (RAN) is the principal naval force of the Australian Defence Force (ADF). The professional head of the RAN is Chief of Navy (CN) Vice Admiral Mark Hammond AM, RAN. CN is also jointly responsible to the Minister of ...

(RAN), and

United States Army Air Forces The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF or AAF) was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and ''de facto'' aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War II ...

(USAAF). Wishing to return to Melbourne, he stepped down as Deputy Chief of the Division of Radiophysics in January 1944, and took charge of the Valve Laboratory at the University of Melbourne. On 1 January 1945 he became Professor of Physics at the University of Melbourne vice Laby, a position he held until 1959. He built up a nuclear physics research school at a time when Australian universities were only just beginning to award PhDs, and most research students went abroad to pursue their studies. He attempted to equip it as best as his limited funds would allow. Wherever possible, equipment and parts were built by staff and students. His

cosmic ray Cosmic rays are high-energy particles or clusters of particles (primarily represented by protons or atomic nuclei) that move through space at nearly the speed of light. They originate from the Sun, from outside of the Solar System in our own ...

group participated in the 1947–48 Antarctic expedition of , and he designed and built a 200 kV

neutron generator Neutron generators are neutron source devices which contain compact linear particle accelerators and that produce neutrons by fusing isotopes of hydrogen together. The fusion reactions take place in these devices by accelerating either deu ...

and a 1

MeV In physics, an electronvolt (symbol eV, also written electron-volt and electron volt) is the measure of an amount of kinetic energy gained by a single electron accelerating from rest through an electric potential difference of one volt in vacu ...

Van de Graaff generator A Van de Graaff generator is an electrostatic generator which uses a moving belt to accumulate electric charge on a hollow metal globe on the top of an insulated column, creating very high electric potentials. It produces very high voltage ...

. A 3 MeV

betatron A betatron is a type of cyclic particle accelerator. It is essentially a transformer with a torus-shaped vacuum tube as its secondary coil. An alternating current in the primary coils accelerates electrons in the vacuum around a circular path. Th ...

was converted an 18 MeV electron synchrotron in 1948. A 5 to 12 MeV

cyclotron A cyclotron is a type of particle accelerator invented by Ernest O. Lawrence in 1929–1930 at the University of California, Berkeley, and patented in 1932. Lawrence, Ernest O. ''Method and apparatus for the acceleration of ions'', filed: Jan ...

was the largest machine built at the university up to that time. Design work began in 1953, and it commenced operation in 1957, running until 1976. Martin did not have the money to build it, but managed to scrounge funding and components from various sources. Although he was an

experimental physicist Experimental physics is the category of disciplines and sub-disciplines in the field of physics that are concerned with the observation of physical phenomena and experiments. Methods vary from discipline to discipline, from simple experiments and ...

, he created a theoretical physics group under Courtney Mohr. He also managed to persuade the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) to transfer CSIRAC, Australia's first digital electronic computer, to the School of Physics in 1955, creating the first academic computing facility in Australia, and the beginning of computer science at the University of Melbourne.

Other work

The Council for Scientific and Industrial Research created the Atomic Physics Section in 1947 led by Martin. In 1948 he became a member of the Interim Council of the Australian National University. He was president of the Australian Branch of the Institute of Physics in 1952 and 1953. From 1953 to 1963 he was a Trustee of the Science Museum of Victoria and its chairman in 1962 and 1963. He became a Foundation Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science in 1954 and was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of London in 1957. For his work in education and defence he was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the 1954 Birthday Honours, and he was Knight Bachelor, knighted to honour his outstanding contributions to science in the 1957 New Year Honours. He was a Pro-Vice-Chancellor for the University of Melbourne in 1957. Some of his many other posts included being the Defence Scientific Adviser and chairman of the Defence Research and Development Policy Committee from 1948 to 1968. He was present at the British Operation Hurricane nuclear test in the Monte Bello Islands off the coast of Western Australia in October 1952, and then for Operation Totem tests at Emu Field in South Australia in October 1953. When the British government established the Maralinga, Maralinga Test Range in 1953, the Australian government created the Maralinga Safety Committee, which became the Atomic Weapons Test Safety Committee, with Martin as its chairman. As such he was responsible for safety of the Operation Mosaic tests at Monte Bello in May and June 1956, and British nuclear tests at Maralinga#Operation Buffalo, Operation Buffalo tests at Maralinga in September and October 1956, after which he handed over the chairmanship to Ernest Titterton. An advocate for the peaceful use atomic energy, Martin became a member of the Industrial Atomic Energy Policy Committee in 1949, and a member of the Scientific Advisory Committee of the

in 1953. In 1958 he was an Australian delegate to the United Nations conference on Atoms for Peace in Vienna. That year, he was appointed a member of the Australian Atomic Energy Commission, and was its deputy chairman when he retired in 1968. Martin was the full-time chairman of the Australian Universities Commission from August 1959 until he retired in 1966. In this time he oversaw a rapid expansion of Australian higher education, including the commencement of five new universities. In 1961 he became chairman of the Committee on the Future Development of Tertiary Education in Australia, a position he held until 1965. The committee's advice led to a formalised "binary divide" between the universities, as research and teaching institutions, and other higher education teaching institutions, mostly college of advanced education, colleges of advanced education. The links between his academic activities and his defence activities led him to work for the establishment of the RAAF College at RAAF Williams, Point Cook as an affiliated college of the University of Melbourne in 1961. In 1967 he became the chairman of the government's Tertiary Education (Services' Cadet Colleges) Committee that began planning for the Australian Defence Force Academy (ADFA). During this year he also became Professor of Physics and the first Dean of the Faculty of Military Studies for the

, at the

until he retired in 1971.

Retirement

Martin retired in March 1971, stepping down as a director of IBM Australia Limited and as the chairman of the editorial council of Pergamon Press. He lived in Canberra for a while, but moved back to Melbourne to be near his four grandchildren. He suffered a stroke in 1979, but recovered. He died suddenly in Camberwell, Victoria, Camberwell on 1 February 1983, and his remains were cremated. He was survived by his wife and son Raymond.

LH Martin Institute

The University of Melbourne formed the LH Martin Institute on 30 August 2007. The institute is interdisciplinary and has as its key objectives: * to train the next generation of leaders of Australia's tertiary education in the strategic management of their institutions; * to provide a forum in which public policy makers, public and private sector institutions and national and international experts can explore, assess and anticipate the changing national and international environment in which tertiary education operates; and * to support its educational programs with scholarship and research.

Sir Leslie Martin Prize

In 1971 Duntroon established the Sir Leslie Martin Prize which has been awarded every year until 1985, and from then at ADFA since 1986. The prize is awarded for "distinguished performance by a First Year Officer Cadet in First Year Physics" from all streams, that is, all Physics, Engineering and Arts students who take Physics I.

Publications

*''The high frequency K series absorption spectrum of erbium''. Royal Society of Victoria. Proceedings., 35 (1922), 164–169. *(With E.C. Stoner) ''The absorption of x-rays''. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, A, 107 (1925), 312–331. *''Some measurements on the absorption of x-rays of long wave-length''. Cambridge Philosophical Society. Proceedings., 23 (1927), 783–793. *''The efficiency of K series emission by K ionised atoms''. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, A, 115 (1927), 420–442. *(With K.C. Lang) ''X-ray absorption coefficients in the range 0.3 to 2.0 Å''. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, A, 137 (1932), 199–216. *(With K.C. Lang) ''The thermal conductivity of water''. Physical Society, London. Proceedings., 45 (1933), 523–529. *(With W.G. Kannuluik) ''Conduction of heat in powders''. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, A, 141 (1933), 144–158. *(With W.G. Kannuluik) ''The thermal conductivity of some gases at 0 °C''. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, A, 144 (1934), 496–513. *(With J.C. Bower and T.H. Laby) ''Ionization in gases by x-rays as shown by expansion chamber observations''. Sydney. University. Cancer Research Committee. Journal., 6 (1934), 131–143. *(With J.C. Bower and T.H. Laby) ''Auger effect in argon''. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, A, 148 (1935), 40–46. *(With F.F.H. Eggleston) ''The Auger effect in xenon and krypton''. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, A, 158 (1937), 46–54. *(With F.F.H. Eggleston) ''The angular distribution of photoelectrons from the K shell''. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, A, 162 (1937), 95–110. *(With A.A. Townsend) ''The beta-ray spectrum of RaE''. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, A, 170 (1939), 190–205.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Martin, Leslie Harold 1900 births 1983 deaths Alumni of Trinity College, Cambridge University of Melbourne faculty Australian Commanders of the Order of the British Empire Australian Fellows of the Royal Society Australian Knights Bachelor Australian physicists Experimental physicists Fellows of the Australian Academy of Science Scientists from Melbourne People from Footscray, Victoria