Alan Bicksler Fowler (October 15, 1928 – August 4, 2024) was an American

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 ...

Life and education

He was born in Denver, Colorado on October 15, 1928. Fowler served in the U.S. Army from 1946 to 1948 and from 1952 to 1953. He earned a BS in 1951, then an MS in 1952 from

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (; RPI) is a private university, private research university in Troy, New York, United States. It is the oldest technological university in the English-speaking world and the Western Hemisphere. It was establishe ...

Troy, New York Troy is a city in and the county seat of Rensselaer County, New York, United States. It is located on the western edge of the county, on the eastern bank of the Hudson River just northeast of the capital city of Albany, New York, Albany. At the ...

. In 1958, he earned his PhD from

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

. Fowler was married to Kathleen Devlin for 65 years, until her death in 2016, with whom he had two sons and two daughters. He is a member of the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, NGO, 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 ...

. Fowler died on August 4, 2024, at the age of 95 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Career

He worked as a researcher for

Raytheon Technologies RTX Corporation, formerly Raytheon Technologies Corporation, is an American multinational aerospace and defense conglomerate headquartered in Arlington, Virginia. It is one of the largest aerospace and defense manufacturers in the world by reve ...

, from 1953 to 1956, and for IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center from 1958 to 1993, and was a member of the IBM MOS research group. He is an IBM Fellow Emeritus. Fowler is named as a co-inventor in nine U.S. Patents. Fowler was awarded the Oliver E. Buckley Condensed Matter Prize by 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 ...

in 1988.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fowler, Alan 1928 births 2024 deaths 21st-century American physicists IBM Fellows Foreign members of the Royal Society Scientists from Denver Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Oliver E. Buckley Condensed Matter Prize winners Harvard University alumni Fellows of the American Physical Society