Obituary of Simon Foner

Simon Foner, experimental physicist in magnetism and superconductivity and their applications died October 2, 2007. He was active in his laboratory and involved in journal editorial activities to very near the end of his life. Tireless tinkerer with experimental apparatus, restless gadfly, uncontrollable (and unredeemable) punster, Si will be greatly missed by his many friends in the physics and engineering communities, including those, mostly from prestigious laboratories and universities, with whom he worked so tirelessly on a plethora of committees, boards, panels, advisory groups, and workshops.

Born August 13, 1925 in Pittsburgh, Si remained in that area for his higher education, receiving his BS from what is now Carnegie Mellon University in 1947, masters in 1948, and doctorate in 1952 under the direction of Emerson Pugh. From 1944-46, Si served in the US Navy, troubleshooting sonar equipment aboard naval vessels in the Pacific theatre. In 1953 Si took a position as staff physicist at the MIT Lincoln Laboratory, where he served until 1961. It was at Lincoln Labs that he developed the idea for and eventually patented the vibrating sample magnetometer. Si’s name will forever be associated with that versatile and widely used method for magnetism measurements.

In 1961, Si became one of the founding staff members of the new MIT high- field magnet laboratory, principally founded by Ben Lax, and later named for Francis Bitter, the Francis Bitter National Magnet Laboratory. Until 1977 he was a Project Leader for the FBNML and then became its Chief Scientist. He served for two years (1988-9) as Associate Director of the lab and after 1982, was Senior Research Scientist affiliated with the MIT Physics Department. It was while at FBNML that Si assumed several positions of influence and authority in the greater condensed matter physics community. He was chair of the APS Condensed Matter Physics Division from 1978-81 and filled the role of that division’s Councillor from1982-6. He served as chair of the IEEE Magnetics Society as late as 2000 and was an Advisory Editor of the Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials, 1975-1989. From 1979 until very recently, Si was an active consulting editor of the Review of Scientific Instruments, responsible for expanding the scope and increasing the number of the journal’s review articles.

A highly prolific experimentalist, Si published more than 400 refereed papers in his lifetime. He edited four books on the topics of superconductivity and magnetism and their applications. He played an active role in many conferences on those subjects, hosting no less than four well-attended NATO Advanced Study Institutes in Europe between 1970 and 1980. In the 1980’s Si took an active interest in developing high-quality superconducting wire for high field applications and was responsible for the measurement and understanding of many materials in superconductivity and magnetism. During this time, 1983-5, he was chair of the International Cryogenics Materials Conference. Si and his colleagues at FBNML were pioneers in pulsed high field magnet technology; his advances in this area underpin much of the currently used modern pulsed field magnet technology. In the mid-1980s, Si used a high-strength, metal matrix, copper/niobium microcomposite conductor to wind magnets that generated millisecond-length fields in the 60-70 T range; those magnets were regularly and successfully operated at FBNML. Even after the DC high-field facility stopped running in 1995, Si continued to use the magnets for experiments with collaborators that included Yaacov Shapira, Robert Guertin, and others.

Si Foner’s honors included fellowship in AAAS, IEEE (winning the Millennium Medal in 2000), and the American Physical Society. He was honored for his invention of the vibrating sample magnetometer in 1999 by winning the Joseph F. Keithley Award on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the founding of the APS. Si was chosen Distinguished Lecturer for the IEEE Magnetics Society in 1995-97. A familiar figure at the APS March meetings, Si will be remembered for buttonholing participants at all hours of the day and night, challenging their contentions (and pretensions), keeping them honest, and yet it was all done without rancor. Si Foner’s professional life was dedicated to honest scientific advancement, and there is every indication that he thoroughly enjoyed the ride.