Dr TUDOR E. JENKINS, MA, DPhil (Oxon), FInstP

Dr TUDOR E. JENKINS, MA, DPhil (Oxon), FInstP

Born 18/09/49 – 03/11/09

Dr. Tudor Jenkins, who died after a short illness on 3rd November 2009, aged 60, was an inspiring university teacher, and a physicist who developed new ways of studying the electronic properties of solids using optical spectroscopy.  

Tudor was born in Treherbert, Rhondda Fawr on 18 September 1949.  He was the son of Morgan Jenkins, an electrical engineer in the local colliery, and his wife Violet (née Pearson).  Educated at Rhondda County Grammar School, Porth, he was the first member of his family to attend University, reading Physics at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, where he was an Open Scholar.  He joined the Clarendon Laboratory, Oxford, where he obtained a D.Phil. in the electronic properties of insulating solids under the supervision of Dr. J.W. Hodby.  Tudor subsequently spent four years as a post-doctoral research assistant in Cardiff University, establishing Raman scattering techniques for the study of orientational disorder in molecular solids.

He was appointed Lecturer in micro-electronics at St.Andrew's University in 1979, where his interest in semiconductors began and where he also pioneered the application of early microcomputers to undergraduate teaching and research.  In 1983, he joined the Department of Physics at Aberystwyth, establishing a research group studying the properties of ultra-thin films on solids.  Tudor became a Senior Lecturer in 1990 and a Reader in Physics in 2007.  It was in Aberystwyth that his inspirational qualities as a teacher came to the fore, receiving the university's 2005 award for Teaching Excellence.

During the last decade, Tudor Jenkins successfully combined the use of X-rays, neutron scattering and optical spectroscopy to obtain new information about the atomic coordination of insulating, semiconducting and metallic thin films, which are used in microelectronics, optics and catalysis.  In recent years he developed the technique of optical ellipsometry to the point where it can now be used to image electronic contrast on surfaces.   He was a Fellow of the Institute of Physics and was active in supporting its Accreditation programmes for many years.  In Wales he was ever enthusiastic about branch activities, receiving the IoP Chair of Branches Medal for services to Physics in Wales in 2003.

Despite his many duties at Aberystwyth University and with the IoP, Tudor found time to write two physics textbooks.  He was also a considerable musician, particularly competent on the tuba, and on the lute, guitar, piano and organ.  Tudor was a member of the Aberystwyth Silver Band for 26 years.  In sport, he was an energetic squash player and a karate expert (first kyu rank).  Tudor was also joint co-founder of an interactive science demonstration unit, known as Infinity – visiting schools and Eisteddfodau over many years.

Dr Tudor Jenkins was a committed and colourful colleague, famous for his often pithy Latin quotations with which he ended his e-mails.  Looking forward to rationalising teaching modules for the 2009 session, he concluded wryly with Occam's Razor:  entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem, which approximately translates as "entities must not be multiplied beyond necessity". Tudor was always a pragmatist.

Professor Neville Greaves, Director of the Institute of Mathematics and Physics, Aberystwyth University.