Willis Lamb

Willis Lamb
Lamb in 1955
Born	Willis Eugene Lamb Jr. (1913-07-12)July 12, 1913 Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Died	May 15, 2008(2008-05-15) (aged 94) Tucson, Arizona, U.S.
Alma mater	University of California, Berkeley (BS, 1934; PhD, 1938)
Known for	Measuring the Lamb shift (1947)
Spouse	Ursula Schäfer ​ ​ (m. 1939; died 1996)​
Awards	Rumford Prize (1953) Nobel Prize in Physics (1955) Einstein Prize for Laser Science (1992)
Honors	National Medal of Science (2000)
Scientific career
Fields	Physics Atomic physics
Institutions	Columbia University (1938–1951) Stanford University (1951–1956) University of Oxford (1956–1962) Yale University (from 1962)
Thesis	I. On the Capture of Slow Neutrons in Hydrogenuous Substances, II. Electromagnetic Properties of Nuclear Systems  (1938)
Doctoral advisor	J. Robert Oppenheimer
Doctoral students	Bernard T. Feld Balázs László Győrffy Norman Myles Kroll Theodore Maiman Robert Retherford Marlan Scully

Willis Eugene Lamb Jr. (/læm/; July 12, 1913 – May 15, 2008) was an American physicist who shared the 1955 Nobel Prize in Physics with Polykarp Kusch "for his discoveries concerning the fine structure of the hydrogen spectrum". Lamb was able to precisely determine a surprising shift in electron energies in a hydrogen atom (see Lamb shift). Lamb was a professor at the University of Arizona College of Optical Sciences.