Charles of the Day: Charles Hard Townes

Charles of the day:  Charles Hard Townes

Charles Hard Townes(born July 28, 1915) is an American Nobel Prize-Winning physicist and educator. Townes is known for his work on the theory and application of the Maser, a device that produces coherent electromagnetic waves through amplification by stimulated emission. The most important type of maser is the hydrogen maser which is currently used as an atomic frequency standard, also known as an Atomic clock. These clocks are the most accurate time and frequency standards known, and are used as primary standards for international time distribution services, to control the wave frequency of television broadcasts, and in global navigation satellite systems such as GPS. For their research in the field of stimulated emission, Townes, along with Nikolay Basov and Alexander Prokhorov, who first described the theoretical principles describing the operation of a maser, were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1964. Thank you Charles, for making a profound impact in the realm of physics.

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