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Name of creator

Brian Williamson Powell (1934 -)

Biographical history

Brian Williamson Powell was born at Welwyn Garden City (England) on the 18th March 1934.

He graduated in physics in 1954 at the University of Manchester. From 1954 to 1955, still in Manchester, he joined the Anthony Newth group in order to work in the field of Cosmic Ray Physics. After working in the same field for the Imperial College of Science and Technology (University of London). He was awarded a Research Fellowship by the DSIR in 1957 to continue working on equipment for the semi-automatic measurement of bubble chamber photographs. In 1959 he obtained the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Cosmic Ray Physics. For the period from 1959 to 1969, he joined in the development of the CERN IEPS (Instrument pour l'Evaluation des Photographies).

Also involved in the development of the future Hough-Powell device (the HPD), Paul Hough came to CERN at about the same period. At the end of 1959, together they talked about Hough's ambition to find better ways of measuring photographs. They came up with the idea of what was initially called IEP-X and later became the HPD. In 1960, they developed and presented the basis of a technique for the automatic exploration of photographs under on-line computer control. This method allows faster measurement and analysis of bubble chamber photographs. Its construction and programming developed form with the collaboration between the Laboratories of Berkeley, Brookhaven, CERN and Rutherford.

Immediate source of acquisition or transfer

Received from Brian Powell, 27 September 1999.