Noah Hershkowitz


Noah Hershkowitz is an American experimental plasma physicist. He was jointly awarded the 2004 James Clerk Maxwell Prize for Plasma Physics with Valery Godyak for his research on low-temperature plasmas. These include radio frequency wave heating, sheath physics, potential profiles, diagnostic probes, and the industrial applications of plasmas.
He is also known to have worked on magnetic confinement fusion as well as solitons in plasmas.

Early life and career

Hershkowitz obtained a bachelor's degree from Union College in 1962 and a Ph.D. in physics from Johns Hopkins University in 1966. Upon graduation, Hershkowitz remained at the university to become an instructor in physics until 1967, where he was employed as assistant professor at the University of Iowa until 1980. During this time between 1974 and 1975, he was a visiting professor at the University of California, Los Angeles. Between 1980 and 1981, he was a visiting professor at the University of Colorado, Boulder. In 1981, he became a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and is currently Irving Langmuir Professor of Engineering Physics.

Honors and awards

Hershkowitz has been a fellow of the American Physical Society and the IEEE since 1981. In 2004, he received the James Clerk Maxwell Prize for Plasma Physics with Valery Godyak.