| Professor Frank Bowden | |
| Birth Name: | Frank Philip Bowden |
| Birth Date: | 1903 5, df=y |
| Birth Place: | Hobart, Tasmania |
| Thesis Title: | The mechanism of electrode reactions |
| Thesis Url: | http://ulmss-newton.lib.cam.ac.uk/vwebv/holdingsInfo?bibId=35440 |
| Thesis Year: | 1929 |
| Awards: | Elliott Cresson Medal Rumford Medal Fellow of the Royal Society[1] |
Frank Philip Bowden CBE FRS[1] (2 May 1903 - 3 September 1968) was an Australian physicist.
He was born in Hobart, Tasmania, the son of telegraph engineer Frank Prosser Bowden.
Bowden received his Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Tasmania in Australia in 1925, a Master of Science degree there in 1927 and a Doctor of Science (D.Sc) degree in 1933, by which time he was working at the University of Cambridge in England.[2] He gained his PhD from Cambridge in 1929.
Between 1931 and 1939, Bowden worked as a lecturer in physical chemistry at the University of Cambridge. He moved back to Australia in 1939 to work at the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation.[2] He returned to Britain in 1946 as a reader in physical chemistry.
In 1957, Bowden became Reader of Physics at Cambridge, and in 1966 became the Professor of Surface Physics. He made significant contributions to the field of tribology and he received the International Award from the Society of Tribologists and Lubrication Engineers in 1955.[3] He was also named as one of 23 "Men of Tribology" by Duncan Dowson.[4] Much of Bowden's tribology research was performed alongside David Tabor,[5] [6] [7] [8] [9] with whom he published his popular book The Friction and Lubrication of Solids
Bowden died on 3 September 1968.[2]
He married Tasmanian Margot Hutchison in London in 1931. They had 3 sons and a daughter.[11]