杰弗里·泰勒Geoffrey Ingram Taylor

杰弗里·泰勒 的父亲是 Edward 泰勒（1855年生于伦敦帕丁顿），他是一位艺术家，为远洋客轮上的公共房间进行设计和装饰。他也是一位风景画家，并绘制了出色的花卉素描。他的母亲 Margaret Boole（约1859年生于爱尔兰）是 乔治·布尔 和 玛丽·埃佛勒斯·布尔 的次女，因此 泰勒 是 乔治·布尔 的外孙，而 艾丽西亚·布尔·斯托特 是他的姨妈。他有一个弟弟 Julius，约生于1889年。

泰勒 在汉普斯特德上学，在那里他开始发现自己对科学的热爱。11岁时，他参加了一系列关于 The principles of the electric telegraph 的儿童圣诞讲座，这些讲座给他留下了深刻的印象。在其中一次讲座中，他被介绍给了 开尔文，而 开尔文 告诉他，自己曾与 泰勒 的祖父 乔治·布尔 交好。

1899年，泰勒 进入大学学院学校，1905年他获得了剑桥大学三一学院的奖学金。在那里他学习数学，参加 阿尔弗雷德·诺思·怀特海、埃德蒙·泰勒·惠特克 和 戈弗雷·哈罗德·哈代 的讲座。在完成数学荣誉学位考试第一部分后，他转向物理学，参加自然科学荣誉学位考试第二部分。随后他获得了在三一学院进行研究的奖学金。

他最早的研究之一是关于激波的理论研究，其中他扩展了 开尔文 的工作。这一贡献为他赢得了史密斯奖。他还按照 J J Thomson 的建议进行了实验工作，以检验量子理论。1910年，他被选为三一学院的研究员。次年，他被任命到一个气象学职位，成为动力气象学讲师，他在大气湍流方面的工作促成了他的著作 Turbulent motion in fluids 的出版，该书于1915年在剑桥获得了 约翰·柯西·亚当斯 奖。

英国豪华客轮泰坦尼克号于1912年4月15日在其从英格兰南安普敦到美国纽约的处女航中沉没。4月14日午夜前不久，被认为是不可沉没的泰坦尼克号在纽芬兰以南约650公里处与冰山相撞。这艘船在十六个水密舱中有四个进水时仍能漂浮，但至少有五个被冰山撞破。由于这场灾难，1913年在伦敦召开了第一次国际海上人命安全会议。其提议之一是建立国际冰情巡逻队，以警告船只北大西洋航道上的冰山。1913年， Scotia 号船是第一艘被派往执行此类巡逻的船只，而 泰勒 在该船上担任气象学家。他借此机会进行了一系列压力、湿度和温度的测量，后来他以此为基础建立了空气湍流混合的理论模型。

第一次世界大战爆发时，泰勒主动请缨，被派往法恩伯勒的皇家飞机制造厂，将他的科学才能用于飞机的设计与操作。在这里，他研究螺旋桨轴的应力问题。这促使他思考材料的极限强度，并影响了他后来的一些研究项目。然而，泰勒并未将此视为研究人员的办公室工作，因为他非常积极地学习驾驶飞机和进行跳伞。

泰勒回到剑桥大学三一学院担任讲师。在这一阶段，他研究的一个课题是将湍流应用于海洋学。他还研究了物体穿过旋转流体的问题。1923年，泰勒被任命为皇家学会研究教授，即Yarrow研究教授。这使他得以停止此前已从事四年的教学工作。正如乔治·巴彻勒在[3]中所写：-

他并非天生的讲师，对教学也不太感兴趣……

在这一阶段，泰勒在流体研究中取得了大量根本性的进展。这一时期在[3]中有所描述：-

他在流体和固体力学方面的研究范围极其广泛，其中大多数都展现出他当时正因此成名的独创性和洞察力。

他开展了关于晶体材料变形的研究，这项工作是从他在第一次世界大战期间于法恩伯勒的工作发展而来的。在他研究的众多课题中，还有对湍流的另一项重大贡献，他通过速度涨落的统计研究引入了一种新方法。

1925年，泰勒与斯蒂芬妮·雷文希尔结婚；他们没有子女。这段婚姻持续了42年，直到1967年斯蒂芬妮去世。

泰勒再次将其专业知识应用于军事问题，如冲击波的传播，研究空气中的波和水下爆炸。

战争结束后，泰勒继续他的研究，借此机会对一些问题进行了更彻底的调查，而此前寻找解决方案的压力使他无法进一步深入研究。他于1952年退休，但在皇家学会的持续支持下，他继续在剑桥工作，直到1972年，几乎没有证据表明他的身份有任何改变。那一年，他中风，仅部分康复。在最后的三年里，他因渴望重返科学工作却因身体状况不允许而感到沮丧。

泰勒一生中获得过许多荣誉。他于1919年当选为皇家学会会士，1933年获得其皇家奖章，1944年获得其科普利奖章：-

……因其对空气动力学、流体动力学和金属结构的诸多贡献，这些贡献对物理科学的进步及其应用产生了深远影响。

同样在1944年，他被授予爵士称号，并于1969年被授予功绩勋章。他当选为许多国家学术团体的成员，包括美国、法国、意大利、瑞典、荷兰、印度、波兰和苏联。他获得了世界各地十几所大学的荣誉学位，以及二十多枚奖章，以表彰他对应用数学的杰出贡献。在他漫长的职业生涯中，他在应用数学、数学物理和工程学方面发表了250多篇论文。他的贡献在[3]中总结如下：-

泰勒的工作对流体和固体力学及其在气象学、海洋学、航空学、金属物理学、机械工程和化学工程中的应用具有极其重要的意义。他的思维方式类似于乔治·加布里埃尔·斯托克斯、开尔文和瑞利，尽管他从实验中获得的比这三人中的任何一位都多。他拥有罕见的荣誉，即在他有生之年看到自己的科学论文，其中一些以前未发表，被收集起来并出版成四卷厚书。

如果不描述泰勒在数学之外的一些兴趣，任何关于他的传记都将是不完整的。我们已经提到他年轻时乘坐Scotia号的航行，但他对船只的热爱比这更早；可以追溯到他的童年。他小时候喜欢在小船上摆弄，这种热情在晚年继续存在，当时他拥有一艘19吨的独桅帆船，他与妻子一起航行到设得兰群岛、挪威和罗弗敦群岛[1]：-

旅行总是吸引他，特别是如果它带他去游客不知道且未被物质发展“破坏”的陌生地方。1929年，在参加太平洋科学大会后，他与妻子一起探索了婆罗洲。他是一位敏锐而有洞察力的植物学家，对他在剑桥精心打理的花园中熟悉的植物以及他在其他地方和国外看到的植物都感到极大的乐趣。

Geoffrey Taylor's father was Edward Ingram Taylor (born Paddington, London, 1855) who was an artist who designed and decorated the public rooms in ocean liners. He was also a painter of landscapes and did exceptional drawings of flowers. His mother, Margaret Boole (born in Ireland about 1859), was the second daughter of George Boole and Mary Boole, so Geoffrey was a grandson of George Boole and Alicia Stott was his aunt. He had a younger brother Julius who was born about 1889.

Geoffrey Taylor attended school in Hampstead, and there he began to find his love of science. At the age of 11 he attended a series of children's Christmas lectures on The principles of the electric telegraph and these made a strong impression on him. He was introduced to William Thomson at one of these lectures and Lord Kelvin told him he had been friendly with Geoffrey Taylor's grandfather George Boole.

In 1899 Taylor went to University College School and in 1905 he won a scholarship to study at Trinity College, Cambridge. There he read mathematics, attending lectures by A N Whitehead, Whittaker and G H Hardy. After taking Part I of the Mathematical Tripos he moved towards physics taking Part II of the Natural Sciences Tripos. He then won a scholarship to undertake research at Trinity College.

One of his first pieces of research was a theoretical study of shock waves where he extended work by Thomson. This contribution won him a Smith's Prize. He also undertook experimental work, following a suggestion by J J Thomson, to test quantum theory. In 1910 he was elected to a Fellowship at Trinity College. The following year he was appointed to a meteorology post, becoming Reader in Dynamical Meteorology, and his work on turbulence in the atmosphere led to his publication Turbulent motion in fluids which won the Adams Prize at Cambridge in 1915.

The British luxury passenger liner the Titanic sank on 15 April 1912 on its maiden voyage from Southampton, England, to New York, in the United States. A little before midnight on 14 April the Titanic, which was considered unsinkable, collided with an iceberg about 650 km south of Newfoundland. The ship could float with four of its sixteen watertight compartments flooded but at least five were holed by the iceberg. As a result of the disaster, the first International Convention for Safety of Life at Sea was held in London in 1913. One of its proposals was to establish an International Ice Patrol to warn ships of icebergs in the North Atlantic shipping lanes. The ship the Scotia was the first vessel sent on such a patrol in 1913, and Taylor served as meteorologist on the ship. He took the opportunity to take a whole range of measurements of pressure, humidity and temperature on which he was later to base his theoretical model of turbulent mixing of the air.

The outbreak of World War I saw Taylor offer his services and he was sent to the Royal Aircraft Factory at Farnborough to use his scientific skills in the design and operation of aeroplanes. Here he worked on the stress on propeller shafts. This led him to think about the limiting strengths of materials and this influenced some of his later projects. Taylor did not treat this as an office job for a researcher, however, for he took a very active part learning to fly aeroplanes and make parachute jumps.

After World War I Taylor returned to a lectureship at Trinity College, Cambridge. One of the topics he worked on at this stage was an application of turbulent flow to oceanography. He also worked on the problem of bodies passing through a rotating fluid. In 1923 Taylor was appointed to a Royal Society research professorship as a Yarrow Research Professor. This enabled him to stop teaching which he had been doing for the previous four years. As Batchelor writes in [3]:-

He was not a natural lecturer and not much interested in teaching...

At this stage Taylor made a great many fundamental steps in the study of fluids. This period is described in [3]:-

His investigations in the mechanics of fluids and solids covered an extraordinary wide range, and most of them exhibited the originality and insight for which he was now becoming famous.

He undertook research on the deformation of crystalline materials, work which led on from his World War I work at Farnborough. Among the many topics he studied was another major contribution to turbulent flow, where he introduced a new approach through a statistical study of velocity fluctuations.

In 1925 Taylor married Stephanie Ravenhill; they had no children. It was a marriage which lasted for 42 years until Stephanie's death in 1967.

During World War II Taylor again worked on applications of his expertise to military problems such as the propagation of blast waves, studying both waves in the air and underwater explosions.

Taylor continued his research after the end of the War, taking the opportunity to complete some more thorough investigations into problems where previously the pressure of finding solutions had prevented him from taking his study further. He retired in 1952 but, still supported by the Royal Society, he continued his work at Cambridge with little evidence that his status had in any way changed until 1972. In that year he suffered a stroke from which he only partially recovered. During his last three years he suffered the frustrations of wanting to get back to scientific work although his physical condition would not allow it.

Taylor received many honours during his life. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1919, winning its Royal Medal in 1933 and its Copley Medal in 1944:-

... for his many contributions to aerodynamics, hydrodynamics, and the structure of metals, which have had a profound influence on the advance of physical science and its applications.

Also in 1944 he was knighted and appointed to the Order of Merit in 1969. He was elected to membership of academic societies in many countries including the United States, France, Italy, Sweden, The Netherlands, India, Poland, and the USSR. He received honorary degrees from more than a dozen universities throughout the world and over twenty Medals for his outstanding contributions to applied mathematics. He published over 250 papers in his long career on applied mathematics, mathematical physics and engineering. His contribution is summed up in [3] as follows:-

Taylor's work is of the greatest importance to the mechanics of fluids and solids and to their application in meteorology, oceanography, aeronautics, metal physics, mechanical engineering and chemical engineering. The nature of his thinking was like that of Stokes, Kelvin and Rayleigh, although he got more from experiments than any one of these three. He had the rare honour of seeing his scientific papers, some previously unpublished, gathered together and published in four thick volumes during his lifetime.

No biography of Geoffrey Taylor would be complete without describing some of his interests outside mathematics. We have already mentioned his voyage on the Scotia when he was a young man, but his love of boats went back earlier than this; it went back to his boyhood. He loved messing about in small boats as a boy and his passion continued in later life when he owned a 19 ton cutter in which he sailed with his wife to the Shetlands, to Norway, and to the Lofoten Islands [1]:-

Travel always appealed to him, especially if it took him to strange places unknown to tourists and "unspoiled" by material development. With his wife he explored Borneo in 1929 after attending a Pacific Science Congress. He was a keen and perceptive botanist, and took a great pleasure in the familiar plants of his well-stocked garden in Cambridge and in what he saw elsewhere and abroad.