Frederick Kantor
{{Short description|American physicist and inventor (1942–2020)}}
{{Infobox scientist
| name = Frederick W. Kantor
| image = File:Frederick W. Kantor.png
| caption = Kantor in 2018
| birth_date = {{Birth date|1942|7|19}}
| birth_place = United States
| death_date = {{death date and age|2020|5|15|1942|7|19}}
| death_place = New York, New York
| spouse =
| fields = Physics, Inventions
| workplaces = Columbia University
| alma_mater = Columbia University (1964){{citation|title=Photos from Alumni Reunion Weekend and Dean's Day – Class of 1964|date=Summer 2014|publisher=Columbia University|work=Columbia College Today|url=https://www.college.columbia.edu/cct/archive/summer14/webexclusive/view_photos_from_alumni_reunion_weekend_and_dean_s_day|accessdate=2017-12-17}}
| doctoral_advisor = Robert Novick
| academic_advisors = Polykarp Kusch
| notable_students =
| known_for = Information mechanics
| awards =
| signature =
}}
Frederick Kantor (July 19, 1942 – May 15, 2020) was an American physicist and inventor. He is known for his early work on digital physics, originally coined by Kantor as information mechanics which described "previously thought dissimilar phenomena, such as the fine structure constant (on the
scale of the very small) and cosmological red shift (on the scale of the very large)".
Greg Bear cited Kantor's Information Mechanics as an inspiration for his 1990 novel Heads.{{cite book | last=Bear | first=G. | title=The Collected Stories of Greg Bear | publisher=Tom Doherty Associates | series=Tom Doherty Associates Books | year=2003 | isbn=978-0-7653-0161-1 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_J9AdpBgClAC&pg=PA93 | pages=93–94}} A Reddit editor named delverofsecrets created an Internet hoax involving an apparently chance meeting of Kantor and hundreds of Reddit followers at 6½ Avenue in Manhattan on July 12, 2012; the crowd was eventually dispersed by the New York Police Department.{{citation|author=Matt Silverman|work=Mashable|title=The Chosen One: Meet the Man Who Sparked the Reddit Mystery|url=http://mashable.com/2012/07/14/reddit-mystery-code-video/}}{{citation|title=What Happens When a Mob of Redditors Congregate to Solve—or Not Solve—a Reddit Mystery|author=Jessica Roy|date=July 12, 2012|newspaper=New York Observer|url=http://observer.com/2012/07/what-happens-when-a-mob-of-redditors-congregate-to-solve-or-not-solve-a-reddit-mystery/}}
Early life and education
Kantor earned his B.A. and Ph.D. from Columbia University.{{Cite web |date=2020-09-18 |title=Obituaries |url=https://www.college.columbia.edu/cct/issue/fall-2020/article/obituaries |access-date=2022-07-23 |website=Columbia College Today |language=en}} For his doctoral thesis, he invented a way to polish the surfaces of an X-ray telescope.
Inventions
In addition to his efforts in digital physics Kantor holds numerous patents.
{{citation|title=Kantor Patents at Justia.com |url=https://patents.justia.com/inventor/frederick-w-kantor}}{{primary source inline|date=May 2020}} The later patents deal with several classes of inventions: Rotary Inertial Thermodynamics; dynamic transport of waste fluids in rivers; and a fiber-optic device for persons with macular degeneration. Another invention, never patented, was a File Content Signature utility that was used by electronic bulletin board operators to identify duplicates.{{citation needed|date=May 2020}}
X-ray telescope
However, the invention with potentially greatest impact at present is his earliest work on "Glancing-incidence radiation focusing device having a plurality of members with tension-polished reflecting surfaces". This patent, available at Google patents
{{citation|title=Glancing-incidence radiation focusing device having a plurality of members with tension-polished reflecting surfaces |url=https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/76/ad/dd/ffa8364dbee782/US3543024.pdf}} clearly shows the concentric glancing incidence design for X-ray collection. Kantor's innovation, the use of surface tension to achieve a super-smooth reflecting surface is at the heart of the proposed NASA Lynx Observatory,
{{citation|title=[NASA] Lynx X-ray Observatory |url=https://wwwastro.msfc.nasa.gov/lynx/docs/science/observatory.html}} which describes the same physical process as "grazing incidence.".
Kantor's work, part of his doctoral project at Columbia University, was supported in part by government funding. It was done prior to the Bayh–Dole Act, and Columbia did not seek any patent rights. Subsequent to his patents, designs for a NASA project were developed later by Lockheed Corporation, asserting government use rights to apply the invention. Whether the Lynx observatory will be implemented remains an open question.
Personal life and family
Kantor died May 15, 2020.{{cite news|title=Frederick Kantor obituary|newspaper=The New York Times|date=May 19, 2020|via=Legacy.com|url=https://www.legacy.com/obituaries/nytimes/obituary.aspx?n=frederick-kantor&pid=196209902}} His brother, Paul B. Kantor., is professor emeritus of Information Science at Rutgers University.[https://comminfo.rutgers.edu/kantor-paul Paul Kantor faculty page], Rutgers University official website, accessed February 25, 2023
Bibliography
- {{cite book|first=Frederick W.|last=Kantor|title=Information Mechanics |publisher=Wiley-Interscience|year=1977|isbn=9780471029687|oclc=869307439}}
- {{citation|title=An informal partial overview of information mechanics|last=Kantor|first=F. W.|date=June 1982|journal= International Journal of Theoretical Physics|volume =21|issue=6–7|pages=525–535|doi=10.1007/BF02650182|bibcode=1982IJTP...21..525K|s2cid=121068252}}
- {{citation|title=New X‐Ray Telescope is Sensitive, Light and Cheap|journal= Physics Today |volume=20|number=3 |page=88 |year=1967|doi=10.1063/1.3034240|bibcode=1967PhT....20c..88.}}
References
{{reflist|refs=
{{citation|title=A brief introduction to information mechanics|url=https://www.gravityresearchfoundation.org/pdf/awarded/1974/kantor.pdf|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20160615102231/https://www.gravityresearchfoundation.org/pdf/awarded/1974/kantor.pdf|archivedate=2016-06-15|via=Gravity Research Foundation|year=1974|first=Frederick W.|last=Kantor}}
{{citation|journal=International Journal of Theoretical Physics|date=February 1989|volume=28|issue=2|pages=231–233|title=Maximum mass-particle velocities in Kantor's information mechanics|first=Daniel I. |last=Sverdlik|doi=10.1007/BF00669814|bibcode=1989IJTP...28..231S|s2cid=122242896}}
{{citation|title=The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology|author=Ray Kurzweil|publisher=Penguin|year=2005|isbn=9781101218884}}
}}
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Category:21st-century American physicists
Category:Columbia College (New York) alumni
Category:Columbia Graduate School of Arts and Sciences alumni