C. Kumar N. Patel

 

          

Kumar Patel is professor of physics, chemistry, and electrical engineering at University of California, Los Angeles. Simultaneously, he is the founder, CEO and Chairman of the Board of Pranalytica, Inc., a Santa Monica based company that is commercializing highly sensitive and selective trace gas sensors and high power quantum cascade lasers for commercial, homeland security and defense markets.

From March 1993 to December 1999, he was the Vice Chancellor of Research at UCLA. Until joining UCLA in March 1993, he was Executive Director, Research, Materials Science, Engineering and Academic Affairs Division at AT&T Bel Laboratories, Murray Hil , New Jersey. He is inventor of the carbon dioxide laser. His work at AT&T Bell Laboratories led to the creation of the field of high power molecular lasers, infrared nonlinear optics, ultra small absorption measurement techniques for gases, solids, and liquids, and laser surgery. He has authored/coauthored over 230 publications and has been awarded 43 U.S. Patents.

Dr. Patel is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Engineering. In 1980 Dr. Patel was elected an Honorary Member of the Gynecologic Laser Surgery Society, and in 1985 he was elected an Honorary Member of the American Society for Laser Medicine and Surgery.

For his seminal contributions to lasers and quantum electronics, Dr. Patel has received many awards including the highest awards of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers and the Optical Society of America. He received the National Medal of Science from the President of the United States in July 1996.
He is the Past President of the American Physical Society (1995) and the Sigma Xi, The Scientific Research Society (1993-1995). He co-chaired (with N. Bloembergen) the American Physical Society Study of the Science and Technology of Directed Energy Weapons.

Dr. Patel received his B.E. in Telecommunications from the Col ege of Engineering in Poona, India in 1958. He received M.S. and Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University in 1959 and 1961, respectively. In 1988, he was awarded an honorary Doctor of Science degree from the New Jersey Institute of Technology. (1/14/2009)