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Professional biography (one-pager)
Current Vita, January 1995.
Henry Kolm is one of the founders of the MIT Francis Bitter National
Magnet Laboratory, an authority on electromagnetic technology with over
30 years of experience, and a recognized inventor, innovator and
industrialist. He has been involved in the start-up of ten high
technology ventures, and was named Entrepreneur of the Year 1981 by
Money Magazine. He was awarded the Peter Mark Medal by the Department of
Defense for outstanding contributions to electromagnetic launch
technology. In 1994 he was named "Engineer of the Year by the New
England Section of the American Institute of Aeronautics and
Astronautics in recognition of his development of the Magplane system.
Kolm is a founder of Magnion, Thermomagnetics, Sala Magnetics, Piezo
Electric Products, Inc., Electromagnetic Launch Research Inc., (now
Kaman Electromagnetics Inc.), Magplane Technology, Micromag Corporation,
and Kolm Air Transport Inc.. He is Senior Scientist (emeritus) and
Lecturer, Dept of Aeronautics and Astronautics at the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology.
During World War II, Kolm served with the 20th Armored Division and
later with the Intelligence Service, where he was a member of the team
which planned the strategic bombing of German industry and of "project
paperclip", which brought Wernher Von Braun and his Peenemunde rocket
team to the US, along with over 300 other key technologists.
After earning his Ph.D. in Physics from MIT in 1955 (for the first
observation of quantized vorticity in superfluid helium), Kolm developed
world record electromagnets (both pulsed and continuous), designed the
MIT National Magnet Laboratory, and initiated its programs of high field
applications. He built the first in-situ niobium-tin superconducting
magnet, the first closed-loop supercritical helium cooling system, the
first pulsed field metal forming system, and the first superconducting
maglev system. He invented high gradient magnetic separation and
filtration, the Magneplane system of magnetically levitated
transportation (with Richard Thornton), and developed the first
practical synchronous electromagnetic aircraft catappults and projectile
launchers.
Kolm has consulted extensively to industry and government; he has
published three Scientific American articles, about 60 professional
papers, made several science films, contributed to several NOVA
programs, and is an author of over 30 US patents and their foreign
counterpart patents in cryogenic, magnetic and piezoelectric
applications, and non-destructive testing (proofloading) of aircraft
structures.
Kolm is a member of IEEE, AIP, AIAA, is fluent in French and German; he
holds a first degree black belt in Korean Karate, a commercial pilot
license with multi-engine, seaplane and instrument ratings, and owns and
operates a Navajo Chieftain.
Henry and Elizabeth Cushing Kolm make their home in Wayland,
Massachusetts.
PS: Kolm was grounded by a stroke in 1997 and Elizabeth died in 2002
(Continue to Full
Professional Biography)
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