Harry L. Swinney: Nonlinear science and chaos pioneer
- 1Department of Physics, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742
- 2Department of Physics, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332
- 3Department of Physics, Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, Tandon School of Engineering, New York University, New York, NY 10012
Abstract
Harry Leonard Swinney passed away peacefully at his home in Austin, Texas, on July 13, 2026, at the age of 87. Harry was an exceptional experimental physicist, well-known for elegant studies of instabilities, nonlinear dynamics, chaos and pattern formation in a wide variety of fluid, chemical, and granular systems, work whose influence propagated into numerous scientific and engineering disciplines well beyond the particular problems that prompted it. The late Russell Donnelly of the University of Oregon used to say, “Harry is a prince”; Russ meant it, in the spirit of the tenth-century Persian poet Ferdowsi, as a compliment affirming the nobility, dignity, integrity, and grace with which Harry pursued his science and treated everyone he worked alongside.
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BibTeX
@article{lathrop2026harry,
title = {{Harry L. Swinney: Nonlinear science and chaos pioneer}},
author = {Daniel Lathrop and Michael Schatz and Katepalli Sreenivasan},
journal = {Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.1073/pnas.2634679123},
url = {https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2634679123},
note = {CC BY-NC-ND 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Harry L. Swinney: Nonlinear science and chaos pioneer
AU - Daniel Lathrop
AU - Michael Schatz
AU - Katepalli Sreenivasan
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/21
JO - Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
DO - 10.1073/pnas.2634679123
UR - https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2634679123
AB - Harry Leonard Swinney passed away peacefully at his home in Austin, Texas, on July 13, 2026, at the age of 87. Harry was an exceptional experimental physicist, well-known for elegant studies of instabilities, nonlinear dynamics, chaos and pattern formation in a wide variety of fluid, chemical, and granular systems, work whose influence propagated into numerous scientific and engineering disciplines well beyond the particular problems that prompted it. The late Russell Donnelly of the University of Oregon used to say, “Harry is a prince”; Russ meant it, in the spirit of the tenth-century Persian poet Ferdowsi, as a compliment affirming the nobility, dignity, integrity, and grace with which Harry pursued his science and treated everyone he worked alongside.
SN - 0027-8424
SN - 1091-6490
ER -