Jerald Ericksen

Jerald Ericksen Laverne ( born December 20, 1924 in Portland ( Oregon)) is an American engineer and applied mathematician scientist for mechanics.

Life

Ericksen studied at Oregon State College, at the University of Washington ( Bachelor 1947), at Oregon State University ( Master's degree in 1949, interrupted by service in the U.S. Navy in the Pacific during World War II ) and at Indiana University, where he received his doctorate in mathematics in 1951 at David Gilbarg ( Some problems connected with geometrical ideal gas flow). 1951-1957 he worked as a scientist ( mathematician and solid-state physicist ) at the Naval Research Laboratories. From 1957 he was assistant professor and later associate professor of mechanics at the Johns Hopkins University. Since 1982 he has been Professor of Mechanics and Mathematics at the University of Michigan. In 1991 he retired and moved to Florence ( Oregon).

He dealt with a non-linear continuum mechanics and elasticity theory, theory of elastic shells and columns, Thermodynamics of the continuum, viscoelasticity, liquid crystals, defect theory, magneto- elasticity, rheology, theory of phase transitions in solids as that of the martensite transition, looking for better constitutive equations for novel materials.

In continuum mechanics, he worked with Clifford Truesdell, under whose influence he came to Indiana University in the early 1950s. Investigations continued into the Naval Research Laboratories, where in addition to Truesdell and Ericksen also Ronald S. Rivlin, William Saenz and Richard Toupin were involved. He also worked at this time in the field of rheology as a consultant to the polymer research group of the National Bureau of Standards. His studies of liquid crystals began at Johns Hopkins University in the late 1950s.

He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering and an honorary doctorate from the National University of Ireland and Heriot- Watt University. In 1979 he received the Timoshenko Medal. He is an honorary member of the Royal Irish Academy. In 1968 he received the Bingham Medal of the Society of Rheology and 2000 he was made an honorary member of the International Liquid Crystal Society. He received the award for his life's work of the International Society for the Interaction of Mathematics and Mechanics ( ISIMM ) first.

He was married to Marion Pook since 1946 and has two children.

His doctoral counts Constantine Dafermos.

Writings

• Introduction to the thermodynamics of solids, Springer Verlag 1991, 1998
• Mechanics and Mathematics of crystals - Selected Papers of Jerald L. Ericksen, Editor Millard F. Beatty, Michael A. Hayes, World Scientific 2005
• Publisher with Constantine Dafermos, David Children Teacher (Editor) Amorphous Polymers and Non- Newtonian fluids, Springer Verlag 1987
• Editor David kid teacher Theory and application of liquid crystals, Springer Verlag 1987
• Publisher: Homogenization and effective moduli of materials and media, Springer Verlag 1986
• Appendix: Tensor Fields in Siegfried Flügge (ed.) Encyclopedia of Physics / Handbuch der Physik, Band III / 1 Principles of Classical Mechanics and Field Theory, Springer Verlag 1960