Robert Millikan

Robert Andrews Millikan (March 22, 1868 – December 19, 1953) was a U.S. experimental physicist who won the 1923 Nobel Prize for his measurement of the charge on the electron and for his work on the photoelectric effect. He later studied cosmic rays.

Later life

In 1917, solar astronomer George Ellery Hale convinced Millikan to begin spending several months each year at the Throop College of Technology, a small academic institution in Pasadena, California that Hale wished to transform into a major center for scientific research and education. A few years later Throop College became the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), and Millikan left the University of Chicago in order to become Caltech's "chairman of the executive council" (effectively its president). Millikan would serve in that position from 1921 to 1945. At Caltech most of his scientific research focused on the study of "cosmic rays" (a term which he coined). In the 1930s he entered into a debate with Arthur Compton over whether cosmic rays were composed of high-energy photons (Millikan's view) or charged particles (Compton's view). Compton would eventually be proven right by the observation that cosmic rays are deflected by the Earth's magnetic field.

Related Topics:
1917 - George Ellery Hale - Pasadena, California - California Institute of Technology - University of Chicago - 1921 - 1945 - Cosmic rays - 1930s - Arthur Compton - Magnetic field

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In his private life, Millikan was an enthusiastic tennis player. He was married with 3 sons, the eldest of which, Clark B. Millikan, became a prominent aerodynamic engineer.

Related Topics:
Tennis - Clark B. Millikan - Aerodynamic

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He died at his home in San Marino, California in 1953 and was interred in the "Court of Honor" at Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery in Glendale, California.

Related Topics:
San Marino, California - Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery - Glendale, California

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