John James Nolan (28 December 1888 – 18 April 1952) was an Irish physicist who served as President of the

Royal Irish Academy The Royal Irish Academy (RIA; ), based in Dublin, is an academic body that promotes study in the natural sciences, arts, literature, and social sciences. It is Ireland's premier List of Irish learned societies, learned society and one of its le ...

from 1949 to 1952. He was born near Omagh, County Tyrone and educated at

University College Dublin University College Dublin (), commonly referred to as UCD, is a public research university in Dublin, Ireland, and a collegiate university, member institution of the National University of Ireland. With 38,417 students, it is Ireland's largest ...

(BA 1909, MA 1910, BSc 1911, MSc 1912). He then carried out research in the Physics Department under Professor John A. McClelland on the electrical charge of rain. He was awarded D.Sc in 1914. In 1914, he married Hannah "Teresa" Hurley from near

Bantry Bantry () is a town in the civil parish of Kilmocomoge in the barony of Bantry on the southwest coast of County Cork, Ireland. It lies in West Cork at the head of Bantry Bay, a deep-water gulf extending for to the west. The Beara Peninsula i ...

, in County Cork. The couple had five sons, one of whom died at the end of World War II. He was an uncle of abstract painter Evin Nolan. In 1920, he succeeded McClelland as Professor of Experimental Physics, guiding research into

atmospheric electricity Atmospheric electricity describes the electrical charges in the Earth's atmosphere (or that of another planet). The movement of charge between the Earth's surface, the atmosphere, and the ionosphere is known as the global atmospheric electrica ...

and

aerosols An aerosol is a suspension of fine solid particles or liquid droplets in air or another gas. Aerosols can be generated from natural or human causes. The term ''aerosol'' commonly refers to the mixture of particulates in air, and not to t ...

. Together with his brother, Patrick J. Nolan, and their students, they studied ionization, equilibrium and the relationships of small and large ions in the lower atmosphere. He also, with V. H. Guerrini, developed in 1935 the diffusion battery for measuring the size of aerosol particles. When the School of Cosmic Physics was established at the

Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies The Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies (DIAS) () is a statutory independent research institute in Dublin, Ireland. It was established, under the Institute For Advanced Studies Act 1940, by the government of the then Taoiseach, Éamon de Vale ...

in 1947, John J. Nolan was appointed as its inaugural Chairman. He served until his death in 1952, and was succeeded in this position by

Ernest Walton Ernest Thomas Sinton Walton (6 October 1903 – 25 June 1995) was an Irish nuclear physicist who shared the 1951 Nobel Prize in Physics with John Cockcroft "for their pioneer work on the transmutation of atomic nuclei by artificially accelerate ...

. In 1950, Nolan successfully nominated

Cecil Powell Cecil Frank Powell (5 December 1903 – 9 August 1969) was an English particle physicist who received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1950 for heading the team that developed the photographic method of studying nuclear processes and for the result ...

for the

Nobel Prize in Physics The Nobel Prize in Physics () is an annual award given by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences for those who have made the most outstanding contributions to mankind in the field of physics. It is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the ...

. Five year earlier, he had nominated

Patrick Blackett Patrick Maynard Stuart Blackett, Baron Blackett (18 November 1897 – 13 July 1974) was an English physicist who received the 1948 Nobel Prize in Physics. In 1925, he was the first person to prove that radioactivity could cause the nuclear tr ...

, who became a Nobel laureate in 1948. In 1920, he was elected a Member of the Royal Irish Academy, becoming Secretary in 1923 and President from 1949 to 1952. He was also Registrar of University College Dublin from 1940 until his death. In 1952, he died while lecturing a large class at UCD in Earlsfort Terrace. He was succeeded as professor of physics at UCD in 1953 by his former student T. E. Nevin, whose M.Sc. thesis under Nolan was on "The Effect of Water Vapour on the Diffusion Coefficients and Mobilities of Ions in the Air,"John A. McClelland: The Scientific Work and Legacy of a Physics Pioneer
by Thomas C. O’Connor

References

External links

''Professor J. J. Nolan''
by P. J. MacLaughlin, Studies: An Irish Quarterly Review, Vol. 41, No. 163/164 (Sep-Dec, 1952), pp. 317–322 {{DEFAULTSORT:Nolan, John James 1888 births 1952 deaths People from Omagh Irish physicists Alumni of University College Dublin Presidents of the Royal Irish Academy Academics of the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies