CHARLES H. TOWNES - FIRST DAY COVER SIGNED CO-SIGNED BY: JOHN M.J. MADEY - HFSID 181116

CHARLES H. TOWNES, CO-SIGNED BY: JOHN M.J. MADEY
1946 first day cover honoring the hundredth anniversary of the Smithsonian Institute, signed by the physicists who helped pioneer the laser
First day cover signed "John M. J. Madey" (on front and verso) and "Chas. H. Townes". 6½x3½. First Day Cover honoring the 100th Anniversary of the Smithsonian Institute. Postmarked Washington, D. C., Aug. 10, 1946. One 3-cent Smithsonian stamp affixed. FIRST DAY OF ISSUE. American physicist Charles Hard Townes (1915-2015), shared the 1964 Nobel Prize for Physics with Soviet scientists Aleksandr M. Prokhorov and Nikolay G. Basov "for fundamental work in the field of quantum electronics, which has led to the construction of oscillators and amplifiers based on the maser-laser principle". Townes created the first maser - a predecessor to the laser that amplified microwaves - with two students in 1953. He and A. L. Schawlow also showed that it was possible to construct a laser in 1958, two years before the first ruby laser was built by Theodore Maiman. John M.J. Madey (b. 1943) is a professor of Physics at the University of Hawaii at Manoa known for his work on the free electron laser. While an undergraduate, the question came up as to whether or not it is was possible to enhance the transition rate for bremmsstrahlung through stimulated emission. He continued thinking about the stimulated emission question while working on his doctoral degree at Stanford, when he invented the free electron laser. He was awarded a PhD in 1970, and appointed as Professor of Electrical Engineering in 1986. Stanford University refused to patent this idea so Madey filed for a patent on his own. In the following years, he developed an innovative laser research program (the Free Electron Laser Laboratory) which was highly regarded in the scientific community. Madey served for almost a decade as director of the FEL lab at Duke Univeristy. During that time the lab continued to achieve success both in securing research funding and in generating scientific breakthroughs.Envelope is open and empty. Flap is glued inside envelope. Lightly toned, soiled and rippled. Normal postal stamps, which touch Madey's signatures. Otherwise, fine condition.