Sam Edwards (physicist)

Samuel Frederick Edwards
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Born	(1928-02-01)1 February 1928 Swansea
Died	Cambridge, England
Nationality	British
Fields	physics
Institutions	University of Cambridge
Alma mater	University of Cambridge Harvard University
Doctoral advisor	Julian Schwinger
Doctoral students	Elliott H. Lieb Monica Olvera de la Cruz Michael Cates
Known for	path integral formulation polymer physics spin glass granular material
Notable awards	Maxwell Medal and Prize (1974) Davy Medal (1984) Boltzmann medal (1995) Royal Medal (2001) Dirac Medal (2005)

Sir Samuel Frederick Edwards FLSW FRS (1 February 1928 – 7 May 2015) was a Welsh physicist.

Early life and studies

Sir Samuel was born on 1 February 1928 in Swansea, the son of Richard and Mary Jane Edwards.

He was educated at the Bishop Gore School in Swansea, and Gonville and Caius College, University of Cambridge, the University of Manchester in Britain, and at Harvard University, in the United States. He wrote his thesis under Julian Schwinger on the structure of the electron, and subsequently developed the functional integral form of field theory.

Academic research

Edward's name on Staircase L at Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge in 2010.

Edwards' work in condensed matter physics started in 1958 with a paper which showed that statistical properties of disordered systems (glasses, gels etc.) could be described by the Feynman diagram and path integral methods invented in quantum field theory. During the following 35 years Edwards worked in the theoretical study of complex materials, such as polymers, gels, colloids and similar systems.

He was Chairman of the Science Research Council 1973-1977 and between 1984-1995 was Cavendish Professor of Physics at Cambridge University. He was a member of the Board of Sponsors of The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists[1] and Past President of Cambridge Society for the Application of Research.

Edwards was knighted in 1975. Awards presented to him include the Davy Medal (1984) and the Royal Medal (2001) of the Royal Society, the Boltzmann medal of the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics (1995), and the Dirac Medal of the International Centre for Theoretical Physics (2005). He was also a Founding Fellow of the Learned Society of Wales and he held an honorary degree (Doctor of Science) from the University of Bath (1978).

Sir Sam died in Cambridge on May 7, 2015.

Personal life

In 1953 Sir Sam married Merriell E.M. Bland, with whom he had three daughters and a son.

His relaxations were gardening and chamber music.

References

• (together with contents pages for the above book).
• "International Who's Who"

External links

• Media related to at Wikimedia Commons