Nationality Dutch Name Balthasar der Awards IEEE Medal of Honor Known for Van der Pol oscillator Fields Physics | Education Utrecht University Alma mater Utrecht University Role Physicist | |
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Born 27 January 1889
Utrecht ( 1889-01-27 ) Thesis De invloed van een geioniseerd gas op het voortschrijden van electromagnetische golven en toepassingen daarvan op het gebied der draadlooze telegraphie en bij metingen van glimlichtontladingen [The effect of an ionised gas on electro-magnetic wave propagation and its application to radio, as demonstrated by glow-discharge measurement] (1920) Died October 6, 1959, Wassenaar, Netherlands Books Operational calculus based on the two-sided Laplace integral Notable awards IEEE Medal of Honor (1935), Valdemar Poulsen Gold Medal (1953) | ||
Doctoral advisor Willem Henri Julius | ||
Balthasar van der Pol (27 January 1889 – 6 October 1959) was a Dutch physicist.
Van der Pol studied physics in Utrecht, and in 1920 he was awarded his doctorate (PhD). He studied experimental physics with John Ambrose Fleming and Sir J. J. Thomson in England. He joined Philips Research Labs in 1921, where he worked until his retirement in 1949.
His main interests were in radio wave propagation, theory of electrical circuits, and mathematical physics. The Van der Pol oscillator, one of the most widely used models of nonlinear self-oscillation, is named after him.
He was awarded the Institute of Radio Engineers (now the IEEE) Medal of Honor in 1935. The asteroid 10443 van der Pol was named after him.
Van der Pol became member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1949.