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Agilent Labs' Len Cutler Leaves a Lasting Legacy

 

September 21, 2006

  Len Cutler
 

Agilent Technologies mourns the loss of Len Cutler, Agilent Distinguished Fellow and member of the technical staff in Precision Instrumentation at Agilent Laboratories. After a career of 57 years, Len passed away Sept. 4 while camping with his family in Big Basin, California. He was an internationally recognized inventor who made significant contributions to the worlds of science and technology, particularly in precision time measurement and laser interferometry.

In 2004, Agilent Laboratories promoted Len to Agilent Distinguished Fellow in recognition of his long-standing and far-reaching contributions that have had, and will have, an enduring impact on the company. Len was the first and only person to hold this position, Agilent’s highest technical honor. 

“We honor Len for leaving a lasting legacy, and acknowledge his leadership as an innovator and researcher at Hewlett-Packard and Agilent for almost 50 years,” said Darlene Solomon, chief technology officer and vice president Agilent Laboratories. “Len set the standard for world class research; he served as a mentor to so many of our engineers and scientists at Agilent Labs, and remarkably, continued as an active contributor to our research program until his passing. We have lost a great man, a brilliant researcher, a wise leader and a good friend.”

Len has been aptly named “Father Time.” Over the past 40 years, his innovations and inventions have led to the world’s most accurate commercial time keeping devices, beginning with the first solid-state atomic clock in 1964, and leading up to the Hewlett-Packard 5071A cesium clock, introduced in 1992, with an accuracy of one second in every 1.6 million years. Clocks designed by Len form the cornerstone of the time standard maintained by laboratories throughout the world. His clocks were the first to be flown in airplanes to perform the synchronization of world clocks and later to establish the variations in the flow of time predicted by Albert Einstein. The impact of this work is crucial to modern commerce. Without accurate time keeping, there would be no GPS navigation, modern computer networks would no longer function, and financial transactions would grind to a halt.

Lyons and Sherwood built the first atomic clock in the 1950’s at the National Bureau of Standards based on theoretical work by Maxwell and Rabi. Pioneering work by Townes, Zacharias, Essen, and Ramsey then led to the first cesium beam clock. Len Cutler began his work on atomic clocks at Hewlett-Packard in 1959, introducing the first solid state cesium beam clock in 1964. The performance and reliability of these clocks were much better than anything previously available, so they rapidly captured the market and became widely used throughout the world in applications demanding the precise frequency and time standards.

Over the years, Len and his team made many improvements and innovations resulting in steady improvements in performance. These innovations include both fundamentally new techniques, like trapped ion frequency standards, and optically pumped atomic clocks, as well as many contributions to the optimization and theoretical understanding of the cesium clock.

His work on clocks is only the best-known example of Len’s innovations. He has authored a total of 25 patents in many areas of science and technology. Perhaps his most important invention is his method for the precise measurement of distance using a two-frequency laser interferometer system. This invention is the crucial element in the step-and-repeat lithography systems used for the manufacturing of silicon integrated circuits, in which nanometer resolution is required. Len’s reputation for innovation resulted in his consultation on the high-visibility failure of one of the nation’s premier high-technology rapid transit systems in the early 1970’s. After a serious accident on a major U.S. transit system, he and his colleagues were quickly able to invent a patented logic safety system to prevent future incidents.

In addition to his scientific and technical contributions, Len was one of the founders of Hewlett-Packard Laboratories and was the leader and mentor of several generations of researchers in that lab and its successor, Agilent Laboratories. All who know him agree that Len was among the most brilliant people they have ever met. Without question, Len Cutler was one of industry’s greatest innovators whose inventions touch all of our lives.

Donations may be made to the Association of HP Employees, a non-profit group that helps develop and maintain Little Basin, a campsite for the enjoyment of employees and retirees. All donated funds will be used to create a memorial project in Len Cutler's name. Please make out your checks and send them to the following address:

Association of HP Employees
Attn: Little Basin Account
3000 Hanover St., m/s 1029
Palo Alto, CA 94304

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