SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - A pioneering physicist at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory has died.
Edward Joseph Lofgren led the development, construction and operation of the Bevatron, an early particle accelerator at the lab. A giant machine that smashes atoms, it was used to find the antiproton, a discovery which led to a Nobel Prize. This research helped scientists study how today's universe was created and grew.
He was 102.
Lofgren died in Oakland, California, on Sept. 6, lab spokesman Glenn Roberts Jr. said.
Before his retirement in 1979, he also served as associate laboratory director, and he was the first director of the newly formed accelerator division.
Born Jan. 18, 1914, in Chicago, he moved to Los Angeles at age 13 and finished high school. He later enrolled at UC Berkeley, arriving by bus with two suitcases and $200. He had read about and become increasingly interested in its Radiation Laboratory and the cyclotron developments there.