Bruno Rossi

Bruno Rossi was an Italian-American experimental physicist who lived from 1905 to 1993, known for inventing an improved electronic coincidence circuit foundational to nuclear and particle physics instrumentation and for confirming the instability of mesotrons, or muons, through measurements that validated relativistic time dilation; he later pioneered X-ray astronomy and space plasma physics. He held positions at the University of Florence, University of Padua, University of Manchester, University of Chicago, Cornell University and MIT, and during the Second World War contributed to the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos, developing diagnostic instruments including the fast ionization chamber. He received the National Medal of Science in 1983 and was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1950; the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer satellite and the Bruno Rossi Prize in high energy astrophysics commemorate his work. He received the Wolf Prize in Physics in 1987.