Frank Philip Bowden


Frank Philip Bowden CBE FRS was an Australian physicist.

Early life

He was born in Hobart, Tasmania, the son of telegraph engineer Frank Prosser Bowden.
Bowden received his Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Tasmania in Australia in 1925, a Master of Science degree there in 1927 and a Doctor of Science degree in 1933, by which time he was working at the University of Cambridge in England. He gained his Ph.D from Cambridge in 1929.

Career

Between 1931 and 1939 Bowden worked as a lecturer in physical chemistry at the University of Cambridge before moving back to Australia in 1939 to work at the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation. He returned to Britain in 1946 as a reader in physical chemistry.
In 1957, he became Reader of Physics at Cambridge, and in 1966 became the Professor of Surface Physics.
Bowden died on 3 September 1968.

Private life

He married Tasmanian Margot Hutchison in London in 1931. They had 3 sons and a daughter.

Honours and awards