In this biography
Quick facts
- Born
- 26 April 1879
- Died
- 15 February 1959
- Birthplace
- Dewsbury, England
- Country
- United Kingdom
- Nationality
- Not independently established
- Known for
- Thermionic emission
- First Cambridge degree
- 1900
- American appointment
- Princeton, 1906โ1913
- Later research
- Molecular hydrogen
Why this life matters
His work tested how an empirical fit relates to a physical account of electrons.
Timeline
Key moments
Early emission law
A physical hypothesis became testable.
Wheatstone chair
Kingโs College London.
Retirement
Research continued after the formal appointment.
From Cambridge to electron emission
Richardson entered Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1897 and graduated in 1900. His early work investigated whether electrons emitted by heated material came from the solid rather than mainly from reactions with surrounding gas.
His later lecture placed this investigation after experiments by Elster, Geitel, J. J. Thomson and McClelland.
Testing a formula is not choosing every parameter
Richardson discussed two temperature-emission expressions with different prefactors. K. K. Smithโs tungsten measurements fitted both after their constants were adjusted.
This is a substantive limit of fitting: agreement with observations may leave more than one parameterisation viable. A theoretical preference must be distinguished from what a particular dataset alone can select.
Sources for this section: [5]
Appointments and research leadership
He taught at Princeton from 1906 until the end of 1913, then moved to Kingโs College London.
At Kingโs he held the Wheatstone chair before a research appointment. His wartime thermionic work connected basic physics with vacuum-tube development.
The later appointmentโs starting year differs between institutional records; the broader sequence does not depend on silently choosing one.
Beyond the first law
Richardson also pursued photoelectric effects, electron processes and molecular hydrogen spectra. After retiring in 1944 he continued research; a final paper with E. W. Foster appeared in 1953.
His work crossed an important boundary between a useful empirical expression and a developing microscopic theory. That continuing programme, rather than one formula in isolation, explains the breadth of his career.
Sources for this section: [2]
Quick answers
Frequently asked questions about Owen Willans Richardson
- Was the lecture delivered in the award year?
- No. The award was for 1928; the lecture is dated 12 December 1929.
- Do two successful fits establish one unique theory?
- No. Distinct fitted constants can conceal different functional assumptions.
Keep exploring
Lives connected to this story
- John Bardeen
Compare a later career in electron physics.
- Isidor Isaac Rabi
Read another career connecting precise measurement and institutions.
- Hertha Ayrton
Compare a different experimental programme involving electrical behaviour.
Sources and further reading
Explore the evidence
These references support the biography and offer further reading. Official records, first-person accounts and independent reporting provide different perspectives; image records document attribution and licensing.
- 1. Nobel Prize Outreach / Nobel Foundation, historical recordOwen Willans Richardson: Facts
- 2. Nobel Prize Outreach / Nobel Foundation, historical recordOwen Willans Richardson: Biographical
The historical biography gives 1926 as the Yarrow start; Kingโs gives 1924. The contemporary university announcement corroborates the latter. No uninterrupted present office is inferred.
- 3. Peter Tanner, Kingโs College London COMMENT 141, May 2002, p.7Owen Richardson, Nobel prizewinner
- 4. Nature 155, 265, 3 March 1945University of London
Only the indexed contemporary announcement was read, not the complete issue.
- 5. Nobel lecture, 12 December 1929Thermionic Phenomena and the Laws Which Govern Them