User:Randomandy/Karl L Brown

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Karl L. Brown earned an international reputation as an expert in beam optics for particle accelerators and as a leader in the introduction of the first commercially successful medical accelerator for External_beam_radiotherapy.

Education
Largely inspired by his high school physics teacher (and eventually superintendent) Bry Copley, Brown enrolled at the nearby University_of_Utah where he majored in electrical engineering. Park City silver scholarship to attend

His senior year, he transferred to Stanford_University in order to pursue accelerator physics, completing his Physics B.S. in 1947. He continued at Stanford and in 1949 earned his M.S. with a thesis on the beam dynamics of the first high-powered klystron under his advisor and Klystron pioneer Marvin Chodorow. Then in 1953, under Wolfgang_K._H._Panofsky, the future director of SLAC_National_Accelerator_Laboratory, he completed his Physics Ph.D. with a thesis dealing with the commissioning of the Mark II accelerator.

Medical Accelerators
In the early 1950's, Brown joined a team led by physicist Edward_Ginzton and Dr Henry Kaplan of Stanford_Medical_School to build what became the first linear accelerator in the Western hemisphere to be used in the treatment of cancer.

In 1958, Brown became president and chief scientist of Spectromagnetics, a small-accelerator design and manufacturing firm which was sold in 1966 to Varian_Associates. This led to Brown's employ as Senior Scientist and Director of Research at Varian’s Radiation Division until 1968. While in this role, Brown led the development of the first commercially successful medical accelerator known as the Clinac I. This marked the beginning on an industry and a business for Varian making machines that now treat over 100,000 patients a day.

New Teacher Workshop
As a memorial to Karl Brown's personal interest in physics and education, a training workshop for new high school physics teachers was sponsored in his name starting in 2003(?). The program, PTSOS, trains approximately 200 teachers per year in Northern California and is growing.

Patents

 * Stepped gap achromatic bending magnet
 * Magnetic beam deflection system free of chromatic and geometric aberrations
 * Achromatic magnetic beam deflection system related cases
 * Method of and apparatus for deflecting beams of charged particles
 * Method of focusing charged particles to provide zero momentum dispersion

Awards

 * Fellow of the American Physical Society
 * 1989 Prize for achievement in accelerator physics and technology by the US Particle Accelerator School.