Alan Gent passes

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Tuesday, September 25, 2012
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Akron, OH - Pioneering scientist and educator Alan Gent passed away September 20. Dr. Gent was recipient of the Rubber Division’s George S. Whitby Award for Distinguished Teaching and Research in 1987 and the Charles Goodyear Medal in 1990. He will be missed by all within the industry and academia. A native of Leicester, England, Gent joined the faculty at The University of Akron in 1961 and spent the next half century as a pioneer in his field. Internationally known, Gent was widely regarded as the foremost expert on the fracture mechanics of rubber and plastics. His research yielded significant contributions to the world’s understanding of the physics of adhesion and the fracture of rubbery, crystalline and glassy polymers. Gent’s work had the potential of impacting nearly every rubber or plastic product developed today. During his distinguished career, Gent published more than 200 papers and book chapters on the mechanical properties of rubber and plastics and edited a book titled “Engineering with Rubber.” A co-holder of two British patents and one U.S. patent, he frequently was invited to address universities, corporations, and professional society meetings around the world and served as a visiting professor at Queen Mary College at the University of London, McGill University and the University of Minnesota. Gent also presided over three national scientific societies (The High-Polymer Physics Division of the American Physical Society, The Society of Rheology, and The Adhesion Society) and chaired four Gordon Research Conferences dealing with Elastomers, Cellular Materials, Adhesion, and Composites. In 1991 he was elected to the National Academy of Engineering. Respected and admired by his colleagues and students, Gent never relinquished a desire to contribute to his field, and he remained active with the University and the College of Polymer Science and Polymer Engineering until his passing. In honor of his international recognition and his service to the University of Akron, the Board of Trustees of the University voted unanimously to change the name of the Ohio Research Scholar Professor at The University of Akron and henceforth be named the “Alan N. Gent Ohio Research Scholar Professor of Polymers.”