Nobel Prize for Physics to UCL alumnus Professor Charles Kao

The 2009 Nobel Prize for Physics was awarded to Charles Kuen Kao for groundbreaking achievements concerning the transmission of light in fibres for optical communication. He was awarded half the prize, and the remainder was shared between two other scientists, Willard S Boyle and George E Smith, for their invention of an imaging semiconductor circuit ? the CCD sensor. Professor Kao took his undergraduate degree at the then Woolwich Polytechnic (now Greenwich University). He then went on to complete a PhD through the University of London under the supervision of Prof Harold Barlow from UCL. In his 2003 autobiography he states, ?. I formally registered at University College London, University of London, under the supervision of the Father of Microwaves ? Professor Barlow. Professor Barlow was a prominent pioneer of theoretical and practical microwaves, and had made tremendous contributions to the development of radar during the second world war.