Joseph Ford (18 December 1927 – 26 April 1995) was

Regents' Professor Professors in the United States commonly occupy any of several positions of teaching and research within a college or university. In the U.S., the word "professor" informally refers collectively to the academic ranks of assistant professor, asso ...

of physics at

Georgia Institute of Technology The Georgia Institute of Technology, commonly referred to as Georgia Tech or, in the state of Georgia, as Tech or The Institute, is a public research university and institute of technology in Atlanta, Georgia. Established in 1885, it is part of ...

specializing in

thermodynamics 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 the ...

and

chaos theory Chaos theory is an interdisciplinary area of scientific study and branch of mathematics focused on underlying patterns and deterministic laws of dynamical systems that are highly sensitive to initial conditions, and were once thought to have co ...

Early life and education

Born in

Buncombe County, North Carolina Buncombe County is a county located in the U.S. state of North Carolina. It is classified within Western North Carolina. The 2020 census reported the population was 269,452. Its county seat is Asheville. Buncombe County is part of the Asheville ...

, he was awarded a BS degree by the

in 1952 and a Ph.D in physics by

Johns Hopkins University Johns Hopkins University (Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private university, private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Founded in 1876, Johns Hopkins is the oldest research university in the United States and in the western hem ...

in 1956.

Career

Ford spent two years as a research physicist at

Union Carbide Corporation Union Carbide Corporation is an American chemical corporation wholly owned subsidiary (since February 6, 2001) by Dow Chemical Company. Union Carbide produces chemicals and polymers that undergo one or more further conversions by customers befo ...

Niagara Falls, New York Niagara Falls is a City (New York), city in Niagara County, New York, United States. As of the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, the city had a total population of 48,671. It is adjacent to the Niagara River, across from the city of Niagara ...

before joining the faculty at the

University of Miami The University of Miami (UM, UMiami, Miami, U of M, and The U) is a private research university in Coral Gables, Florida. , the university enrolled 19,096 students in 12 colleges and schools across nearly 350 academic majors and programs, incl ...

in 1958. He was then appointed an associate professor at the

in 1961, rising to become Regents' Professor of Physics there in 1978, a position he held until his death in 1995. He was elected a

Fellow of the American Physical Society The American Physical Society honors members with the designation ''Fellow'' for having made significant accomplishments to the field of physics. The following lists are divided chronologically by the year of designation. * List of American Physic ...

in 1989 "for pioneering contributions in classical and quantal chaos, and for fundamental and significant contributions to theory of statistical mechanics, ergodicity, and stochasticity, and chaos"

Joseph Ford Commemorative Lectures

In 1995, the

Georgia Institute of Technology School of Physics The School of Physics is an academic unit located within the College of Sciences at the Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech), Georgia, United States. It conducts research and teaching activities related to physics at the undergraduate ...

established the Joseph Ford Commemorative Lecture in honor of Ford's Memory.

References

External links

Joseph Ford Papers
- Georgia Tech Library
The New Physics, Chapter 12
- Google Books
Physics Today Volume 48 Issue 10 OBITUARIES

Annual Joseph Ford Commemorative Lecture
1927 births 1995 deaths Georgia Tech alumni Johns Hopkins University alumni Georgia Tech faculty University of Miami faculty 20th-century American physicists Fellows of the American Physical Society {{US-academic-scientist-stub