William Ralph Bennett Jr. (January 30, 1930 – June 29, 2008) was an American
physicist known for his pioneering work on gas
lasers. He spent most of his career on the faculty of
Yale University.
Career
The son of the noted physicist William R. Bennett Sr.,[1] Bennett Jr. received his bachelor's degree in physics from
Princeton University. Bennett's graduate work in physics was on spectroscopy and collisions of the second kind in the
noble gases. He received his Ph.D. from
Columbia University. Bennett became a tenured professor at
Yale University in 1962 and retired in 2000.
He and
Ali Javan co-invented the first gas laser (the helium-neon laser) at
Bell Laboratories in
Murray Hill, New Jersey. He discovered the argon ion laser, was first to observe spectral hole burning effects in gas lasers, and created a theory of hole burning effects on laser oscillation. He was co-discoverer of lasers using electron impact excitation in each of the noble gases, dissociative excitation transfer in the neon-oxygen laser (the first chemical laser), and collision excitation in several metal vapor lasers. He was one of the first to incorporate the use of computers to teach physics and, with his daughter Dr.
Jean Bennett, devised a method of real-time spectral
phonocardiography for the detection and classification of
heart murmurs. He set a stringent limit on the existence of “The Fifth Force” and showed that it was improbable that
magnetic fields from power lines could cause
cancer. He wrote eight books, held twelve patents and published over 120 research papers. He received the 1965
IEEE Morris N. Liebmann Memorial Award.
His research on the physics of musical instruments became the basis of a popular course he gave at Yale. His principal
avocation was playing chamber music. He studied the clarinet with Simeon Bellison and performed as a clarinet soloist with several amateur symphony orchestras. His son
William Bennett was a professional oboist.
"[Pulsed Helium-Neon] Gas Optical Maser" (with A. Javan), U. S. Patent No. 3149290 (granted Sept. 15, 1964)
"[Dissociative Transfer] Gas Optical Maser" (with A. Javan), U. S. Patent No. 3159707 (granted Dec. 1, 1964)
"Frequency Stabilized Optical Maser [based on Spectral Hole-burning]", U. S. Patent No. 3172057 (granted Feb. 16, 1965)
"[High Power] Gaseous Optical Maser", U. S. Patent No. 3172057 (granted March 2, 1965)
"Optical Maser Employing Multiple Gases [Krypton, Xenon and Radon with Helium]" (with W. L. Faust, R. A. McFarlane and C. K. N.Patel, U. S. Patent No. 3278858 (granted Oct. 11, 1966)
"Laser Utilizing Collision Depopulation [of the Lower Level]" (with G. Gould), U. S. Patent No. 3562662 (Granted Feb. 9, 1971)
"Low-Level Laser with Cyclic Excitation [Copper, Manganese, etc., metal vapor lasers]" (with Gordon Gould and W. T. Walter), U. S. Patent No. 3576500 (granted April 27, 1971)
"[Cw Helium-Neon] Optical Maser" (with D. R. Herriott and A. Javan), U. S. Patent No.3614653 (granted Oct. 19, 1971)
"Method and Device for Compensating for Partial Hearing Loss", U. S. Patent No. 4868880 (granted Sept. 19, 1989)
"Dynamic Spectral Phonocardiograph" (with J. B. Maguire), U. S. Patent No. 4967760 (granted Nov. 6, 1990).
"Dynamic Spectral Phonocardiograph [using Computer Diagnostics]" (with J. B. Maguire), U.S.Patent No. 5012815 (granted May 7, 1991).
"Laser with Reduced Intensity Fluctuations" ("Laser Stabilitron" with V. P. Chebotayev), U. S. Patent No.5251229 (Oct. 5, 1993).