Nobel physicist Richardson dies
Robert C Richardson, a Cornell University professor who shared a Nobel Prize for a key discovery in experimental physics, has died at the age of 75.
Cornell said Prof Richardson died in Ithaca yesterday from complications of a heart attack.
He and fellow Cornell researchers David Lee and Douglas Osheroff were awarded the Nobel Prize in 1996 for their 1971 work on low-temperature physics involving the isotope helium-3. The work has contributed to research ranging from microscopic matter to astrophysics.
Prof Richardson was born in Washington DC, earned his Bachelors and Masters degrees in physics at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and a doctorate at Duke University, where he studied with physicist Horst Meyer and later served as a trustee.
He joined Cornell in 1968 and was named Floyd R Newman Professor of Physics in 1987.
