Raymond Davis Jr. (October 14, 1914 – May 31, 2006) was an American chemist and physicist. He is best known as the leader of the Homestake experiment in the 1960s-1980s, which was the first experiment to detect neutrinos emitted from the Sun; for this he shared the 2002

Nobel Prize in Physics.

Early life and education

Davis was born in Washington, D.C., where his father was a photographer for the National Bureau of Standards. He spent several years as a choirboy to please his mother, although he could not carry a tune. He enjoyed attending the concerts at the Watergate before air traffic was loud enough to drown out the music. His brother Warren, 14 months younger than he, was his constant companion in boyhood. He received his B.S. from the University of Maryland in 1938 in chemistry, which is part of the University of Maryland College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences. He also received a master's degree from that school and a Ph.D. from Yale University in physical chemistry in 1942.

Career

After entering the Army as a reserve officer in 1942, Davis spent most of World War II at Dugway Proving Ground, Utah

After his discharge from the Army in 1945,

Davis shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2002 with Japanese physicist Masatoshi Koshiba and Italian Riccardo Giacconi for pioneering contributions to astrophysics, Davis was recognized for his work on the detection of cosmic neutrinos,

Honors and awards

thumb|Davis receiving the Medal of Science from President Bush, with OSTP Director Marburger on the left

  • 2003, Benjamin Franklin Medal (with John N. Bahcall and Masatoshi Koshiba)
  • 2002, Nobel Prize in Physics (with Masatoshi Koshiba)
  • 2001, National Medal of Science
  • 2000, Wolf Prize in Physics
  • 1996, George Ellery Hale Prize of the American Astronomical Society
  • 1994, Beatrice M. Tinsley Prize of the American Astronomical Society
  • 1992, W. K. H. Panofsky Prize of the American Physical Society
  • 1988, Tom W. Bonner Prize of the American Physical Society
  • 1978, Comstock Prize in Physics of the National Academy of Sciences

Notable works

  • – Non-detection of antineutrinos with chlorine
  • – Proposal for Homestake Experiment
  • – final results of Homestake Experiment

Other publications

  • Davis, R. Jr. & D. S. Harmer. "Solar Neutrinos", Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL), (December 1964).
  • Davis, R. Jr. "Search for Neutrinos from the Sun", Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL), United States Department of Energy (through predecessor agency the Atomic Energy Commission), (1968).
  • Davis, R. Jr. & J.C. Evans Jr. "Report on the Brookhaven Solar Neutrino Experiment", Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL), (September 22, 1976).
  • Davis, R. Jr., Evans, J. C. & B. T. Cleveland. "Solar Neutrino Problem", Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL), (April 28, 1978).
  • Davis, R. Jr., Cleveland, B. T. & J. K. Rowley. "Variations in the Solar Neutrino Flux", Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics at University of Pennsylvania, Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL), (August 2, 1987).

References