William Alexander Gambling

William Alexander " Alec " Gambling ( born October 11, 1926) is a British electrical engineer and physicist and pioneer of fiber optics in the UK.

Life and work

Gambling was 1950-1955 Lecturer in Electrical Engineering at the University of Liverpool. 1955 to 1957 he was a visiting scientist at the University of British Columbia. After that, he was at the University of Southampton as a lecturer and from 1964 as professor of electronics. There he founded in 1966 a research group for fiber optics (glass fiber optics ), which he led to international fame. 1974 to 1979 he was Director of its faculty. 1972 to 1975 he was Dean of Engineering and Applied Sciences at the university. From 1980 he was there until 1995 British Telecom Professor of Optical Communications. In 1989 he founded the Community Foundation of the University of London and Southampton, the Optoelectronics Research Centre (ORC ) and was its first director until 1995. Middle of the 1990s he built as a visiting professor ( Royal Society Kan Tong Po Professor ) of the City University of Hong Kong there is also a optoelectronic research center.

He has been a visiting professor at the University of Colorado (1966 /67), at the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre in India ( 1970), Osaka University (1977 ), the University of Cape Town ( 1979). He has several honorary professorships in China.

Mid-1970s, he developed new techniques for glass fibers with low losses.

At its Institute optical amplifier with erbium -doped fiber amplifier (EDFA ) were developed in the late 1980s that revolutionized the optical information transmission over long distance.

2002 to 2007 he was Research Director of Optoelectronics LTK Industries in Hong Kong. In 1978 he was president of the IRE ( Institution of Electronic and Radio Engineers ). He is a Fellow of the Hong Kong Academy of Engineering Sciences, the Vice President, he was from 2004 to 2008.

He is a Fellow of the Royal Society and the Royal Academy of Engineering. He is a foreign member of the Polish Academy of Sciences. In 1987 he became Freeman of the City of London. He is a multiple honorary doctorates ( Polytechnic University of Madrid, Aston University, University of Southampton, University of Bristol ).

In 1990 he received the Dennis Gabor Award, the 1981 Oliver Lodge price of the IEE and the Heinrich Hertz Prize of the IERE, 1983, the Faraday Medal ( IEE ), 1984 Churchill Medal, the Rank Prize in 1991 and 1982, the JJ Thomson Medal.