Dr. C. Kumar N. Patel

Biography

C. Kumar N. Patel is the Founder, President and CEO, of Pranalytica Incorporated, a Santa Monica based company that is commercializing very high performance quantum cascade lasers for a variety of defense and homeland security applications, and highly sensitive and selective trace gas sensors for commercial, homeland security and defense markets. Simultaneously, he is professor of physics, chemistry, and electrical engineering at University of California, Los Angeles. From 1993 to 1999 he was the Vice Chancellor for Research at UCLA. Prior to his joining UCLA in March 1993, he was the Executive Director, Research, Materials Science, Engineering and Academic Affairs Division at AT&T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill, New Jersey. He joined Bell Laboratories in 1961 where he began his career by carrying out research in the field of gas lasers. He has made numerous seminal contributions in several fields, including gas lasers, nonlinear optics, molecular spectroscopy, pollution detection, and laser surgery. Dr. Patel is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Engineering. He is a Foreign Fellow of the Indian National Science Academy and The Institution of Electronics and Telecommunication Engineers (INDIA). He is an Associate Fellow of the Third World Academy of Sciences. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers, the American Physical Society, the Optical Society of America, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Association for Advancement of Arts and Sciences, and the Laser Institute of America. 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. In 1994 he was elected an honorary fellow of the Indian Academy of Sciences. For his discovery of the laser action on the vibrational-rotational transitions of molecules, for his invention of the high power carbon dioxide lasers, for his nonlinear optical studies leading to the invention of the spin flip Raman lasers and for molecular spectroscopy and pollution detection studies, Dr. Patel has received numerous honors. These include the Optical Society of America's Adolph Lomb Medal (1966); the Franklin Institute's Stuart Ballantine Medal (1968); Coblentz Society's (of the American Chemical Society) Coblentz Prize (1974); the Association of Indians in America's Honor Award (1975); the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineer's Lamme Medal (1976); National Academy of Engineering's Zworykin Award (1976); Texas Instrument Foundation's Founders Prize (1978); the Optical Society of America's Townes Medal (1982); the Society of Applied Spectroscopy's N. Y. Section Award (1982); the Schawlow Award of the Laser Institute of America (1984); the New Jersey Governor's Thomas Alva Edison Science Award (1987); the George E. Pake Prize of the American Physical Society (1988); the Technical Excellence Award from the American Society of Engineers from India (ASEI), 1988; the Medal of Honor of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (1989); the Frederic Ives Medal of the Optical Society of America (1989); the William T. Ennor Manufacturing Technology Award of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (1995); Life Time Achievement Award of the Defense & Security Symposium of the SPIE (2006) and the IPPA Prize of The International Photoacoustic & Photothermal Association (2007). In 2012, Dr. Patel was inducted into the United States National Inventors Hall of Fame and in 2013 he was elected a Charter Member of the National Academy of Inventors.

Research Interest

gas lasers, nonlinear optics, molecular spectroscopy, pollution detection, and laser surgery.