Professor Alf Adams
Professor Alf Adams FRS is a well-known British physicist who invented the strained-layer quantum-well laser, considered to be one of the top ten greatest UK scientific breakthroughs of all time.
It powers the internet, CDs, DVDs, supermarket checkouts and billions of other devices.
Biography
After spending two years at the University of Karlsruhe studying the electrical and thermal transport properties of molecular crystals, Alf Adams joined Surrey in 1967.
Life timeline
| Year | Life event |
|---|---|
| 1967 | Joins the University of Surrey |
| 1980 | Takes a sabbatical to work on semiconductor lasers at the Toyko Institute of Technology in Japan |
| 1986 | Along with his team, he proposed that the electronic band structure of quantum-well lasers could be significantly improved by deliberately growing the active layer in a state of strain |
| 1995 | Awared the Duddell Medal and Prize |
| 1996 | Elected Fellow of the Royal Society |
| 2012 | He gives the inaugural lecture at the Royal Society, for the Alf Adams lecture series, established to showcase the University of Surrey's ground-breaking research |
| 2014 | Awarded the Rank Prize for Optoelectronics for his work on strained-layer quantum well lasers |
| 2014 | In March, he was subject of the BBC Radio 4 programme, Professor Jim Al-Khalili's The Life Scientific |
| 2015 | Since retirement from the University of Surrey, he holds the position of Emeritus Professor |
