Robert Pound

{{Short description|Canadian-American physicist (1919 – 2010)}}

{{Infobox scientist

|image =

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|birth_date = {{birth date|1919|5|16}}

|birth_place = Ridgeway, Ontario, Canada

|death_date = {{death date and age|2010|4|12|1919|5|16}}

|death_place = Belmont, Massachusetts

|nationality =

|fields = Physics

|workplaces = Harvard University

|alma_mater = University at Buffalo {{abbr|(BA)|Bachelor of Arts}}

|doctoral_advisor =

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|doctoral_students = Glen Rebka
Neil S. Sullivan
Michio Kaku

|notable_students =

|known_for = {{nowrap|Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR)}}
Pound–Drever–Hall technique
Pound-Rebka experiment

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}}Robert Vivian Pound (May 16, 1919 – April 12, 2010){{cite news|title=Robert Pound, Physicist Whose Work Advanced Medicine, Is Dead at 90|first=Jascha|last=Hoffman|date=April 19, 2010|access-date=April 20, 2010|newspaper=The New York Times|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/20/us/20pound.html}} was a Canadian-American{{cite web|url=http://scienceworld.wolfram.com/biography/Pound.html|title=Pound, Robert Vivian|publisher=Wolfram}} physicist who helped discover nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and who devised the famous Pound–Rebka experiment supporting general relativity.{{cite news|author=Maugh II, Thomas M.|title=Harvard physicist Robert Pound dies at 90|date=6 May 2010|newspaper=Los Angeles Times|url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2010-may-06-la-me-robert-pound-20100429-14-story.html}} He became a tenured professor of physics at Harvard without ever having received a graduate degree.

Pound was born in Ridgeway, Ontario.{{cite news

| url = http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/obituaries/articles/2010/04/25/robert_pound_90_harvard_physicist_confirmed_key_theory_of_einstein/

| title = Robert Pound, 90; Harvard physicist confirmed key theory of Einstein

| author = Bryan Marquard

| work = The Boston Globe

| date = April 25, 2010

| access-date = April 25, 2010

}}

{{blockquote|In 1946 Pound and collaborators Edward Purcell and Henry Torrey adapted the Rad Lab techniques—widely used to this day in radar and communications—to detect nuclear magnetic resonance in condensed matter. Soon NMR became a standard analytical tool in chemistry, biology, and physics, and the "Pound box" marginal oscillator became the standard NMR detector.{{cite journal|title=Robert Vivian Pound|author=Horowitz, Paul|author-link=Paul Horowitz|journal=Physics Today|volume=63|issue=9|page=65|year=2010|doi=10.1063/1.3490509|bibcode=2010PhT....63i..65H|doi-access=free}}}}

The discovery of NMR won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1952,{{cite web|url=https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1952/|title=The Nobel Prize in Physics 1952|publisher=Nobelprize.org|access-date=23 December 2015}} though, due to the limitation on the number of recipients and the simultaneous achievements of Felix Bloch's group, only two recipients were designated. In his address to recipient Ed Purcell, Professor Hulthén nevertheless celebrated the "very interesting experiment you performed together with Dr. Pound",{{cite web|url=https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1952/press.html|title=Award Ceremony Speech|publisher=Nobelprize.org|access-date=23 December 2015}} making Pound one of only two collaborators explicitly named in the speech. Pound received the National Medal of Science in 1990 for his lifetime contributions to the field of physics. Pound was the Mallinckrodt Professor of Physics emeritus at Harvard University. He was a member of the class of 1941 at the University at Buffalo.

Pound's name is also attached to the Pound–Drever–Hall technique used to lock the frequency of a laser on a stable optical cavity.