Percy Williams Bridgman

Percy Williams
Bridgman
Year
1932
Subject
Physics
Award
Cresson
Affiliation
Harvard University │ Cambridge, Massachusetts
Citation
For work in high pressure.

Percy W. Bridgman was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1882. He studied at Harvard University, where he obtained all of his degrees, including his Ph.D. in physics in 1908. Following his degree, Dr. Bridgman joined the faculty and was successively appointed Instructor (1910), Assistant Professor (1919), before becoming Hollis Professor of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy in 1926. He was appointed Higgins University Professor in 1950.

His research focused on effects of high pressures on materials and their thermodynamic behavior. He has also contributed to crystallography, where he devised a method of growing single crystals; to the problems of electrical conduction in metals, where he discovered internal Peltier heat--a new electrical effect; and to the philosophy of modern physics.

In addition to the Cresson Medal of The Franklin Institute awarded in 1932, Dr. Bridgman received many honors, including the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1946.

Information as of 1932