Thomas Lauritsen
Thomas Lauritsen was an American nuclear physicist best known for his abilities at designing and building experimental facilities and instrumentation for experimental nuclear physics; and as the longtime co-author of a periodic compilation of nuclear data. Except for brief periods abroad, his career was entirely at the California Institute of Technology, mostly as a professor of physics. In 1969 he was elected as a member of the National Academy of Sciences and also the American [Academy of Arts and Sciences].
Biography
Lauritsen was the son of Caltech physicist Charles C. Lauritsen and Sigrid Lauritsen, a radiologist. Born in Denmark, he emigrated to the United States with his parents as an infant. Matriculating at Caltech for his undergraduate and graduate years, he participated in the buildup of the experimental facilities of his father's laboratory, one of the frontier nuclear physics laboratories in the 1930s. Devices that he built operated effectively and efficiently. For example, with his contemporary William A. Fowler, he designed and built a pressurized Van de Graaff electrostatic accelerator that operated continuously and productively from 1939 until 1979.In 1939, Lauritsen traveled to the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen, where he built a duplicate of the Caltech accelerator and collaborated on research with Niels Bohr and the latter's son, Aage Bohr. Tommy and Aage became lifelong friends and collaborators. After the German invasion of Denmark in 1940, his return to the United States with his new Danish wife, Else Chievitz, was hastily arranged.
Tommy returned to Denmark for a year in 1952-53 and another year in 1963-64.
Lauritsen's principal research interest was in the nuclear spectroscopy of the light nuclei, particularly in areas
of importance to astrophysics. His most lasting contribution to nuclear physics was the creation of a review publication, "Energy Levels of Light Nuclei" that was issued first in 1948 and in updated versions for many years after.
In the 1960s Lauritsen become involved in many governmental advisory activities to United [States Department of Defense|DOD], ARPA, IDA, United States [Atomic Energy Commission|AEC], and NSF. His collected papers and several oral history interviews are in the Caltech archives.