John Nye (scientist)


John Frederick Nye was the first physicist to apply plasticity to understand glacier flow. Nye's early work was on the physics of plasticity, spanning ice rheology, ice flow mechanics, laboratory ice flow measurements, glacier surges, meltwater penetration in ice, and response of glaciers and ice sheets to seasonal and climatic changes. Later in his long career, he worked extensively in optics, publishing his last paper on electromagnetic wave polarization only a few days before his death.
He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1976. He has served as president of the International Glaciological Society, who awarded him the Seligman Crystal in 1969 for outstanding contributions to glaciology, and was also president of the International Commission of Snow and Ice of the International Association of Hydrological Sciences. The Cryosphere Focus Group of the American Geophysical Union hosts a Nye Lecture each year at its fall meeting.
Nye won the Chree medal and prize in 1989.
Nye was Emeritus Professor in Physics at the University of Bristol, UK. In addition to glaciology, his research interests included caustics and microwave probes.
Nye died on 8 January 2019 at age 95 after a heart failure.

Books