Emil Wolf

Infobox Scientist
box_width = 300px
name = Emil Wolf


image_width = 300px
caption = Emil Wolf
birth_date = July 30, 1922
birth_place = Prague, Czechoslovakia
death_date =
death_place =
residence = United Kingdom United States
citizenship = United States
nationality = Czech-American
ethnicity = Jewish
fields = Physicist
workplaces = University of Edinburgh
University of Rochester
alma_mater = Bristol University
doctoral_advisor = Edward H. Linfoot
academic_advisor =
doctoral_students = Muhammad Suhail Zubairy
notable_students =
known_for = Wolf effect
author_abbrev_bot =
author_abbrev_zoo =
influences =
influenced =
awards = Frederic Ives Medal (1978)
Michelson Medal (1980)
Max Born Medal (1987)
Marconi Medal (1987)
religion =


footnotes =

Emil Wolf (born July 30, 1922) is a Czech born American physicist who made advancements in physical optics, including diffraction, coherence properties of optical fields, spectroscopy of partially coherent radiation, and the theory of direct scattering and inverse scattering.

[http://www.rochester.edu/college/rtc/BigWolf.JPEG]

He is the co-author, along with Max Born, of one of the standard textbooks of optics, "Principles of Optics". He also co-authored, along with Leonard Mandel, "Optical Coherence and Quantum Optics". He is the author of "Introduction to the Theory of Coherence and Polarization of Light" and "Selected Works of Emil Wolf with Commentary".

He also predicted a new mechanism that produces redshift and blueshift, that is not due to moving sources (Doppler effect), that has subsequently been confirmed experimentally (called the Wolf Effect). Technically, he found that two non-Lambertian sources that emit beamed energy, can interact in a way that causes a shift in the spectral lines. It is analogous to a pair of tuning forks with similar frequencies (pitches), connected together mechanically with a sounding board; there is a strong coupling that results in the resonant frequencies getting "dragged down" in pitch. The Wolf Effect can produce either redshifts or blueshifts, depending on the observer's point of view, but is redshifted when the observer is head-on. A subsequent 1999 article by Sisir Roy "et al" have suggested that the Wolf Effect may explain discordant redshift in certain quasars [http://adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-bib_query?bibcode=2000A%26A...353.1134R&db_key=AST&data_type=HTML&format=&high=42ca922c9c04755 Ref] .

Wolf was born in Prague, Czechoslovakia. He was forced to leave his native country when the Germans invaded; After brief periods in Italy and France (where he worked for the Czech government in exile), he came to the United Kingdom in 1940. He received his B.Sc. in Mathematics and Physics (1945), and PhD in Mathematics from Bristol University, England, in 1948. Between 1951 and 1954 he worked at the University of Edinburgh with Max Born, writing the famous text-book on Optics now usually known simply as 'Born and Wolf'. After a period on the Faculty of the University of Manchester, he moved to the United States in 1959 to take a position at the University of Rochester. He is currently (2008) the Wilson Professor of Optical Physics at the University of Rochester. He is a naturalized US citizen.

Awards, memberships and degrees

Awards

*Frederic Ives Medal of the Optical Society of America (OSA) (1978)
*Michelson Medal of the Franklin Institute (1980)
*Max Born Award of the OSA (1987)
*Marconi Medal of the Italian National Research Council (1987)
*Gold Medal of the Czechoslovak Academy of Science (1991)
*Medal of the Union of Czechoslovak Mathematicians and Physicists (1991)
*Gold Medal of Palacky University, Olomouc, Czechoslovakia (1991)

Memberships

*Honorary member of the Optical Society of America (President in 1978)
*Honorary member of the Optical Societies of India and Australia

Honorary Degrees

*University of Groningen, the Netherlands (1989)
*University of Edinburgh (1990)
*Palacky University (1992)
*University of Bristol (1997)
*Université Laval, Quebec (1997)
*University of Franche Comté, France (1999)
*Aalborg University, Denmark (1999).

References

* Wolf, Emil, "Selected Works of Emil Wolf: With Commentary". World Scientific Publishing Company, Incorporated. ISBN 981-02-4205-0
* Born, Max, and Wolf, Emil, "Principles of Optics: Electromagnetic Theory of Propagation, Interference and Diffraction of Light" (7th ed.), Cambridge University Press (1999) ISBN 0-521-64222-1

External links

* [http://www.rochester.edu/college/rtc/Wolf.html "Emil Wolf"] . Home Page, University of Rochester. [http://spider.pas.rochester.edu/mainFrame/people/pages/Wolf_Emil.html more]
* [http://assets.cambridge.org/052164/2221/sample/0521642221ws.pdf "Principles of Optics: Electromagnetic Theory of Propagation, Interference and Diffraction of Light (English)"] Sample chapters.
* [http://www.genealogy.ams.org/id.php?id=107390 Wolf's Math Genealogy]