Ali Javan

Ali Mortimer Javan (Persian: علی جوان), born December 26, 1926 in Tehran , Iran is an Iranian-American inventor and physicist at MIT. He co-invented the gas laser in 1960, with William R. Bennett. He graduated from Alborz High School, started his university studies at University of Tehran and continued at Columbia University after coming to the United States in 1948. He received his Ph.D. in physics in 1954. He joined Massachusetts Institute of T... more

Ali Mortimer Javan (Persian: علی جوان), born December 26, 1926 in Tehran , Iran is an Iranian-American inventor and physicist at MIT. He co-invented the gas laser in 1960, with William R. Bennett. He graduated from Alborz High School, started his university studies at University of Tehran and continued at Columbia University after coming to the United States in 1948. He received his Ph.D. in physics in 1954. He joined Massachusetts Institute of Technology as an associate professor of physics in 1961 and has been a professor since 1964. In 1975, Professor Ali Javan received the most prestigious honor of Optical Society of America, the Frederic Ives Medal, with a citation that praised him for "producing an optical device (the Gas Laser) of unparalleled applicability to scientific research." In 1993, he received the Albert Einstein World Award of Science. On May 6, 2006, Professor Ali Javan was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame, along with another MIT Professor, Robert... less