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George G. Macfarlane

George Gray Macfarlane
Born (1916-01-08)8 January 1916
Airdrie, North Lanarkshire
Died 20 May 2007(2007-05-20) (aged 91)
Nationality British
Known for contribution to radar research

Sir George Gray Macfarlane (8 January 1916 – 20 May 2007) was a British engineer, scientific administrator and public servant.

He made major contributions to research on radar during World War II and received a special appointment as Superintendent, for theoretical work, within the Physics Division of the Telecommunications Research Establishment (TRE) during the post war years, continuing in this capacity when it was renamed the Royal Radar Establishment (RRE). He was appointed Deputy Director of the National Physical Laboratory in 1960, returned to RRE as Director in 1962 and was selected to be the first Controller of Research in the Ministry of Technology in 1967, responsible for the co-ordination of government laboratories with a total staff of 23,000. In 1970 he was transferred to the Ministry of Defence, which had 20 research and development establishments. He consolidated these to just six, and was knighted in 1971. After retiring from this post in 1975, he continued several major professional activities.

George Macfarlane was born in Airdrie, the youngest son of a grocer. Lanarkshire, and attended the Airdrie Academy. He entered the University of Glasgow in 1933, graduating in 1937, then went to the Dresden University of Technology, receiving a doctorate in July 1939, and leaving a month before the outbreak of war.

Soon after the war started, Macfarlane joined the government laboratory that was developing radar and had moved to a site near Swanage in Dorset. The laboratory went through several name changes, and is best known during that period as the Telecommunications Research Establishment (TRE). He applied his strong mathematical skills to the electromagnetic theory of radio wave propagation and reflection, that was the basis of the defensive use of airborne radar in detecting and tracking hostile bombers. He participated in work on the counter measures against radar carried by enemy bombers to locate their targets, and then on work to make the radar carried by British bombers more effective. Shortly before the end of the war, he was attached to an intelligence unit with the advancing allied forces, to collect information on German radar.


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