Robert Byron Bird

Robert Byron Bird (born February 5, 1924 in Bryan, Texas) is a Chemical Engineer and Professor Emeritus in the Department of Chemical Engineering at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He is known for his research in Transport phenomena of Non-Newtonian fluids, including fluid dynamics of polymers, polymer kinetic theory, and rheology. He, along with Warren E. Stewart and Edwin N. Lightfoot, is an author of the classic textbook Transport Phenomena. Bird was a recipient of the National Medal of Science in 1987.

Bird attended University of Maryland from 1941-43 where he was initiated into the Alpha Rho Chapter of Alpha Chi Sigma in 1943. He had to discontinue his studies due to World War II, but Bird received his B.S. degree in Chemical Engineering from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1947 and Ph.D. degree in Physical Chemistry from University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1950. During 1950-1951, he was a Postdoctoral Fellow at Instituut voor Theoretische Fysica, Universiteit van Amsterdam.

Bird is a recipient of the National Medal of Science; the Medal was awarded by President Ronald Reagan "for his profoundly influential books and research on kinetic theory, transport phenomena, the behavior of polymeric fluids, and foreign language study for engineers and scientists." He was awarded the Bingham Medal in 1974 for his outstanding contributions to the field of rheology and Eringen Medal in 1983.]

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