Past Heads of Department

Affiliations

Robert Hunt was a man of many parts, with a pioneering interest in photography, folklore, and science writing. He not only collected and published a collection of Cornish myths and legends, he also became secretary to the Royal Cornwall Polytechnic Society in 1840 and following the invention of the daguerreotype, developed the actinograph. His intense interest in photography led to experiments and research on the action of light. He wrote the first English publication on the subject, ‘ Manual of Photography’ in 1841 as well as ‘ Researches on Light’ in 1844.

He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1854 and a Fellow of the Royal Statistical Society in 1855.

Affiliations

Sir George Gabriel Stokes, 1st Baronet (1819–1903), was a towering figure in 19th-century physics and mathematics. He made foundational advances in fluid dynamics and optics, including the dynamical theory of diffraction and fluorescence. Elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 1851 and recipient of the Rumford Medal, he served as its Secretary from 1854—then as a dominant force advancing British science. Later he became President of the Royal Society (1885–1890). His tenure as Head of Department of Physics at Imperial spanned 1854 to 1859.

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John Tyndall succeeded Stokes as Head of Physics from 1859 to 1868. A celebrated experimental physicist, he is renowned for his research on atmospheric physics, including the Tyndall effect (scattering of light by particles), investigations into infrared radiation absorption by gases, and contributions to glaciology. His clarity in science communication made him a prominent public figure in Victorian scientific circles.

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Frederick Guthrie led the department from 1868 to 1886. Guthrie is known for his early work in thermoelectricity—famously discovering that the heated end of a metal rod is positively electrified—and for his role in founding the Physical Society (which became the Institute of Physics). During his long headship, he guided the department through its foundational years.

Affiliations

Sir Arthur William Rücker (1845–1915) was a distinguished British physicist, elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 1884. His research on liquid films and terrestrial magnetism earned him the Royal Society’s Royal Medal in 1891. He served as Professor of Physics at the Royal College of Science (Imperial’s predecessor) from 1886 to 1901 before becoming Principal of the University of London. He was knighted in the 1902 Coronation Honours.

Affiliations

Callendar was a British physicist best known for his pioneering work on thermodynamics and steam tables, which became the international standard reference for engineers. He also invented the platinum resistance thermometer, which provided a reliable way to measure temperatures with great precision.

He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1894 and held the Chair of Physics at the Royal College of Science (later Imperial College) until his death in 1930.

Affiliations

Sir George P. Thomson (1892–1975) succeeded Callendar in 1930. He won the 1937 Nobel Prize in Physics for electron diffraction, experimentally demonstrating wave–particle duality. During his tenure, he guided Imperial’s physics research into nuclear physics and chaired Britain’s MAUD Committee, which assessed nuclear bomb feasibility during WWII. He was knighted in 1943 and continued his career as Master of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, after 1952.

Affiliations

Patrick Maynard Stuart Blackett, Nobel Laureate in 1948, became Head of the department around 1953 and served until 1963. He transitioned Imperial’s focus to high-energy nuclear physics, oversaw construction of the new Physics (Blackett) Laboratory, and fostered bubble-chamber and cosmic-ray research, including instrumentation sent to NASA satellites.

Affiliations

Sir Clifford Charles Butler (20 May 1922 – 30 June 1999) was a pioneering English particle physicist. Alongside G. D. Rochester at Manchester, he co-discovered "V-particles"—now known as kaons, hyperons, and mesons—in 1946–47, early evidence for the quark structure of matter.

Elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 1961, he was later Dean of the Royal College of Science (1966–1969). From 1970 onward, Butler shifted to educational leadership—serving as Director of the Nuffield Foundation, helping to establish the Open University, and then as Vice-Chancellor of Loughborough University from 1975 to 1985. Knighted in 1983 for his contributions to education.

Affiliations

Paul Taunton Matthews was born in 1919 in India. He came to Imperial College where he distinguished himself in quantum field theory and the theory of Elementary particles. Amongst his doctoral students were Abdus Salam and Faheen Hussain making the theoretical physics group at Imperial one of the most important research groups of their time.

In 1958 he was awarded the Adam’s Prize and elected to the Royal Society in 1963. He was awarded the Rutherford Medal and Prize in 1978. The University of Bath awarded him an Honorary Degree in 1983 and he was also the chairman of the Nuclear Physics Board of the Science Research Council. He also published many books and papers, amongst them are ‘Introduction to Quantum Mechanics’, ‘The Nuclear apple; recent discoveries in fundamental physics’, and ‘Lectures on strong and electromagnetic interactions’. He was also the recipient of the Order of the British Empire.

Affiliations

Ian Butterworth was Head of the Physics Department from 1980 to 1983. A particle physicist, he had joined Imperial in 1958 and became key in bubble-chamber experiments and computing developments. His leadership culminated in moving experiments to CERN. He was later principle of Queen Mary College. 

He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1981, the American Physical Society in 1985. was awarded the CBE in 1984 and held the post of Vice-President of the Academia Europaea from 1997- 2003.

Affiliations

Sir Tom Kibble succeeded Butterworth and served as Head from 1983 to 1991. A theoretical physicist famed for predicting the Higgs mechanism, he was elected FRS in 1980 and received numerous honours including the CBE and Royal Medal. His leadership spanned a pivotal era in fundamental theory research.

Affiliations

David M. Blow headed the department from 1991 to 1994. A structural biologist by training, he was later Director of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL). His tenure marked a period of increasing interdisciplinary collaboration between physics and life sciences.

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David John Southwood, a space scientist, served as Head between 1994 and 1997 before becoming Director of Science at the European Space Agency. His tenure reflected Imperial’s growing engagement with space science and instrumentation.

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Sir John Brian Pendry (born 1943) was Head from 1998 to 2001. A theoretical physicist celebrated for pioneering research in metamaterials and the first practical invisibility cloak, he’s a Fellow of the Royal Society and Laureate of the Kavli Prize, Kyoto Prize (2024), among others.

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Sir Peter Knight is an eminent figure in theoretical quantum optics and quantum information science. Educated at Sussex University (DPhil), he held postdoctoral positions at the University of Rochester and SLAC (Stanford), before joining Imperial College in 1979 as a lecturer, becoming Professor in 1988. Knight served as Deputy Rector (Research) until 2010 and significantly shaped Imperial’s research strategy. His pioneering work includes laser-atom interactions and the foundations of quantum computing. He has received notable honours including a knighthood (2005), the Royal Medal (2010), IOP medals, and led key scientific bodies such as the OSA and IOP.

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Professor Donal Bradley is known for his contributions to the development of molecular electronic materials and devices. Bradley graduated from the Imperial College of Science and Technology with a first class BSc and ARCS in Physics in 1983, and returned as Professor of Experimental Solid State Physics to lead a new strategic initiative on molecular electronic materials, in 2000.

He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 2004, a Fellow of the Institute of Physics (FInstP) in 2005 and Fellow of the Institute of Engineering and Technology (FIET) in 2013. He was appointed Head of the Physics department in 2005 and became Lee-­Lucas Professor in 2006.

Affiliations

Professor Joanna Haigh is a distinguished atmospheric physicist. Educated at Oxford (DPhil) and Imperial College (MSc), she joined Imperial as a lecturer in 1984 and became Professor of Atmospheric Physics in 2001. Her research on solar variability, radiative transfer, stratosphere–troposphere coupling, and climate modelling has significantly advanced understanding of the Sun’s influence on Earth’s climate.

She is a Fellow of the Royal Society (elected 2013), received the IOP’s Charles Chree Medal (2004) and the Royal Meteorological Society’s Adrian Gill Prize (2010), and was appointed CBE in 2013. After serving as Head of Physics, she co-directed the Grantham Institute for Climate Change and Environment from 2014 until her retirement in 2019.

Affiliations

Professor Jordan Nash served as Head of Imperial’s Department of Physics between 2014 and 2017. Taking over in mid-2014, he inherited a department already thriving under Joanna Haigh’s leadership. Nash oversaw key strategic developments during this period, including expanding postgraduate student exchange programs with institutions like MIT, UBC, SNU, and KAIST; enhancing research breadth across fields such as condensed matter, astrophysics, quantum optics, and high-energy physics; and maintaining a strong focus on outreach and diversity, including Athena SWAN and JUNO initiatives. His tenure strengthened the department’s global research engagement and institutional position at the forefront of physics.

Affiliations

Professor Michele K. Dougherty CBE FRS is a distinguished space physicist and leader. Joining Imperial in 1991, she became Professor of Space Physics in 2004 and led the department beginning in 2018, with her term extended through to December 2024. Dougherty is celebrated for serving as Principal Investigator for the magnetometer on NASA’s Cassini mission—contributing to the discovery of water-rich plumes from Saturn’s moon Enceladus—and for her leadership on ESA’s JUICE mission to Jupiter’s moon Ganymede. She was elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 2012, received its Research Professorship in 2014, and has earned honors such as the Royal Astronomical Society Geophysics Gold Medal (2017), a CBE (2018), and the IOP’s Richard Glazebrook Medal (2018). In January 2025, she began serving as Executive Chair of the UK’s Science and Technology Facilities Council and is President-Elect of the Institute of Physics, with her presidency set to begin in autumn 2025. In July 2025, Dougherty was appointed Astronomer Royal by The King.