Chung Liang Tang

Chung Liang Tang (Chinese: 湯仲良; 14 May 1934 – 31 May 2022) was a Chinese-born American applied physicist.

Tang was born in China, and moved to avoid hostilities in the Second Sino-Japanese War and the Chinese Communist Revolution, making his way to San Francisco via Taiwan in 1950.[1] He completed a bachelor's degree from the University of Washington (1955), a master's of science degree from Caltech (1956), and a doctorate at Harvard University (1960),[1][2][3] then pursued postdoctoral research at RWTH Aachen University.[1][4]

Tang worked for Raytheon from 1960 to 1964,[2][5] then joined the Cornell University faculty as an associate professor.[1] He was promoted to a full professorship in 1968,[2] and subsequently appointed the Spencer T. Olin Professor of Engineering in 1985.[2][6] Tang retired from Cornell in 2008.[1][4]

Tang was elected a fellow of the American Physical Society in 1975,[7] the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers in 1977,[1] the Optical Society of America in 1986,[3] and a member of the United States National Academy of Engineering and of Academia Sinica in 1986 and 1994, respectively.[2][5] He was the 1996 recipient of the OSA's Charles Hard Townes Award, recognized "for seminal and pioneering advances in the field of nonlinear optics and laser physics".[8]

Tang was married to Louise, a mathematics instructor at Ithaca College.[4][9] He died on 31 May 2022, aged 88.[1][4][6]