Laser inventor Charles Townes is dead at 99

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Physicist Charles Townes, who shared the 1964 Nobel Prize in physics for his work inventing the laser and maser, died on Tuesday at age 99. U.C. Berkeley, where Townes had been a professor since 1967, said he had been in poor health and died on the way to the hospital. He had visited campus daily until last year.

Townes was 35 in 1951 when he conceived the idea for the maser (microwave amplification by stimulated emission of radiation), an instrument that concentrated microwaves instead of optical light. He built the first maser in 1954, then developed the idea for the laser (light amplification by the stimulated emission of radiation) four years later with future Nobel laureate Arthur Schawlow, his brother-in-law. Townes later pioneered the use of laser and masers in astronomy.

Along with his Nobel Prize, Towns was awarded the Templeton Prize for Progress Toward Research or Discoveries about Spiritual Realities in 2005 — Mother Teresa is the only other person to win both a Nobel and Templeton prize. He is survived by his wife, Frances Hildreth Townes (whom he married in 1941), four daughters, six grandkids, and two great-grandchildren.

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.