COLES D.E.

COLES D.E. 08.02. 1924 St. Paul MN/USA 02.05. 2013 Altadena CA/USA Donald Earl Coles graduated in 1947 as aeronautical engineer from the University of Minnesota, St. Paul MN. In 1948 he went to Caltech, obtaining there the PhD title in 1953. After having worked in its Jet Propulsion Laboratories, he was from 1953 to 1956 a research fellow at Caltech, and there from 1964 professor of aerodynamics until retirement in 1996. In parallel he also was a consultant for the industry from 1954. Coles was a member of the National Commission of Fluid Mechanics Films from 1960, of the American Institute of Aerodynamics and Astronautics AIAA, being the recipient of its 1953 Sperry Award for his PhD thesis, and a member of the American Physical Society APS. Coles is mainly remembered for his outstanding research in the 1950s relating to the turbulent boundary layer. He was interested in the turbulent skin friction on smooth plates, with a large potential to practical applications in the airplane and naval industries, but also in all other high-speed mobiles from cars and trains to rockets. In the 1960s he became interested in jet noise, a problem that was partially solved only recently, after jet airplanes had produced excessive noise mainly in urban environments. Coles in these years also produced a total of 23 educational films mainly relating to problems in aerodynamics. Later, he was member of the Organizing Committee, Stanford Conf. on Computation of Turbulent Boundary Layers. His major papers then dealt with similarity laws for turbulent flow, shock tube design, transition in circular Couette flow, stalling of airfoils, vortex shedding from cylinders, and coherent structures in turbulence. Anonymous (1954). Dr. Donald Coles. Aeronautical Engineering Research 13(3): 45. P Anonymous (1970). Coles, Donald Earl. Who’s who in America 36: 442. Marquis: Chicago. Coles, D. (1954). The problem of the turbulent boundary layer. Zeitschrift für Angewandte Physik 5(3): 181-203. Coles, D. (1954). Measurements of turbulent friction on a smooth plate in supersonic flow. Journal of the Aeronautical Sciences 21(7): 433-448. Coles, D.E. (1956). The law of the wake in the turbulent boundary layer. Journal of Fluid Mechanics 1: 191-226. Coles, D. (1957). Remarks on the equilibrium turbulent boundary layer. Journal of the Aeronautical Sciences 24(7): 495-506. Coles, D. (1963). Estimating jet noise. The Aeronautical Quarterly 14(2): 1-16. https://www.caltech.edu/content/donald-coles-0 P

COLES J.S. 03.06. 1913 Mansfield PA/USA 13.06. 1996 Falmouth MA/USA James Stacy Coles graduated from the Columbia University, New York City NY, with the AM degree in 1936, and the PhD degree in physical chemistry in 1939. He then joined the Middlebury College until 1943 as assistant professor, was research group leader until 1945 of the Underwater Explosives Research Lab, Woods Hole Oceanography Institute of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology MIT, joining then the staff from assistant to associate professor of Brown University, Providence RI until 1952. From then until 1968 he was the president of Bowdoin College, Brunswick ME, and until 1982 the president of the Research Corporation based in New York, a foundation for the advancement of science, from where he retired. During his occupancy, the foundation’s assets increased from 11 to 46 million US$. Coles had a large number of honorary degrees including the LLD degrees from Brown University presented in 1955, from Bowdoin College in 1968, and the DSc degree in 1958 from the University of New Brunswick, Fredericton CA. Under Coles’ leadership at Bowdoin College, its science department modernized, programs for gifted students were implemented, and an independent studies program was initiated. Coles’ presidency also witnessed a major building program, including the Coles Tower, Wentworth Hall and Chamberlain Hall in 1964. Inaugurated in 1964, Coles Tower was for many years the tallest building in Maine. It is a sixteen-story brick residence housing some 200 students in quad suites. Coles was chairman of the Maine Higher Education Advisory Committee from 1965 to 1967, which helped establish the University of Maine System. He further co-authored the book Physical principles of chemistry. The James Stacey Coles Papers include the personal, business and Brown University and Bowdoin College correspondence. Lecture notes, research material and writings both as manuscripts and published are also included. Coles may therefore be considered an outstanding leader of American education during the 1960s and 1970s. Anonymous (1994). Coles, James Stacey. American men and women in science 2: 397. Cole, R.H., Coles, J.S. (1965). Physical principles of chemistry. Freeman: San Francisco. Coles, J.S. (1994). Papers 1936-1993. Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution: Woods Hole MA. https://library.bowdoin.edu/arch/archives/jscg.shtml. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_S._Coles https://dla.whoi.edu/manuscripts/node/164641#id2636522 P