Bogdan Castle Maglich (also spelled Maglic or Maglić) (August 5, 1928,

Sombor Sombor ( sr-Cyrl, Сомбор, ; hu, Zombor; rue, Зомбор, Zombor) is a city and the administrative center of the West Bačka District in the autonomous province of Vojvodina, Serbia. The city has a total population of 47,623 (), while ...

, Yugoslavia – November 25, 2017, Newport Beach, California, US) was a Serbian experimental nuclear physicist and the leading advocate of a purported non-radioactive

aneutronic fusion Aneutronic fusion is any form of fusion power in which very little of the energy released is carried by neutrons. While the lowest-threshold nuclear fusion reactions release up to 80% of their energy in the form of neutrons, aneutronic reactions ...

energy source. Maglich built four models of ''

Migma Migma, sometimes migmatron or migmacell, was a proposed colliding beam fusion reactor designed by Bogdan Maglich in 1969. Migma uses self-intersecting beams of ions from small particle accelerators to force the ions to fuse. Similar systems using l ...

'', devices producing fusion of deuterium atoms in colliding ion beams.

Education and academic work

Maglich received his Bachelor of Science degree from the

University of Belgrade The University of Belgrade ( sr, / ) is a public university in Serbia. It is the oldest and largest modern university in Serbia. Founded in 1808 as the Belgrade Higher School in revolutionary Serbia, by 1838 it merged with the Kragujevac-ba ...

in 1951, his Master of Science from the

University of Liverpool , mottoeng = These days of peace foster learning , established = 1881 – University College Liverpool1884 – affiliated to the federal Victoria Universityhttp://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukla/2004/4 University of Manchester Act 200 ...

in 1955, and his Ph.D. in high-energy physics and nuclear engineering from the

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...

in 1959. Upon receiving his Ph.D., Maglich joined Dr.

Luis Walter Alvarez Luis Walter Alvarez (June 13, 1911 – September 1, 1988) was an American experimental physicist, inventor, and professor who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1968 for his discovery of resonance states in particle physics using the h ...

's research group at Lawrence Berkeley Lab. During this time, he, along with Fred Kirsten, invented the "sonic spark chamber", the first film-less spark chamber particle detector system. Maglich participated in the discovery of the

omega meson The omega meson () is a flavourless meson formed from a superposition of an up quark–antiquark and a down quark–antiquark pair. It is part of the vector meson nonet and mediates the nuclear force along with pions and rho mesons. Propert ...

, as described in Alvarez's Nobel lecture: Between 1963 and 1967, he worked at the European Organization for Nuclear Research ( CERN) in

Geneva, Switzerland Geneva ( ; french: Genève ) frp, Genèva ; german: link=no, Genf ; it, Ginevra ; rm, Genevra is the second-most populous city in Switzerland (after Zürich) and the most populous city of Romandy, the French-speaking part of Switzerland. Situa ...

. While conducting research at CERN, he invented the "missing mass spectrometer". With this instrument, his team of French and Swiss physicists reported the discovery of seven mesons. In 1967, Maglich joined the faculty of the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...

, as well as being visiting faculty at

Princeton University Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ...

. In 1969, he became professor and principal investigator for high energy physics at

Rutgers University Rutgers University (; RU), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a public land-grant research university consisting of four campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's College, and was ...

. In 1974, he left academia to pursue his research in the private sector.

Early work

Maglich first rose to prominence in his field working on a team at the

University of California The University of California (UC) is a public land-grant research university system in the U.S. state of California. The system is composed of the campuses at Berkeley, Davis, Irvine, Los Angeles, Merced, Riverside, San Diego, San Franci ...

Lawrence Radiation Laboratory Lawrence may refer to: Education Colleges and universities * Lawrence Technological University, a university in Southfield, Michigan, United States * Lawrence University, a liberal arts university in Appleton, Wisconsin, United States Preparator ...

analyzing liquid hydrogen

bubble chamber A bubble chamber is a vessel filled with a superheated transparent liquid (most often liquid hydrogen) used to detect electrically charged particles moving through it. It was invented in 1952 by Donald A. Glaser, for which he was awarded the 1 ...

data from Berkeley's

bevatron The Bevatron was a particle accelerator — specifically, a weak-focusing proton synchrotron — at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, U.S., which began operating in 1954. The antiproton was discovered there in 1955, resulting in ...

accelerator. The team, which also included

Luis W. Alvarez Luis Walter Alvarez (June 13, 1911 – September 1, 1988) was an American experimental physicist, inventor, and professor who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1968 for his discovery of resonance states in particle physics using the ...

Arthur H. Rosenfeld Arthur Hinton Rosenfeld (June 22, 1926 – January 27, 2017) was a UC Berkeley physicist and California energy commissioner, dubbed the "Godfather of Energy Efficiency", for developing new standards which helped improve energy efficiency in Cali ...

, and

Lynn Stevenson Merlon Lynn Stevenson (October 31, 1923 – April 10, 2021) was an American physicist. He cofounded Luis Walter Alvarez's research group at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. His first paper presented internationally described proton-ge ...

, discovered the first solid experimental evidence for the existence of the ω

meson In particle physics, a meson ( or ) is a type of hadronic subatomic particle composed of an equal number of quarks and antiquarks, usually one of each, bound together by the strong interaction. Because mesons are composed of quark subparticles, ...

resonance. (In 1968, Luis Alvarez was awarded a

Nobel Prize The Nobel Prizes ( ; sv, Nobelpriset ; no, Nobelprisen ) are five separate prizes that, according to Alfred Nobel's will of 1895, are awarded to "those who, during the preceding year, have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind." Alfr ...

for this and related work.) Maglich's contribution to this discovery led to him receiving a White House citation from President

John F. Kennedy John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK and the nickname Jack, was an American politician who served as the 35th president of the United States from 1961 until his assassination ...

and being named an honorary citizen in Switzerland by the president of the

Swiss Confederation ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...

. Toward the end of the 1960s, R. Macek and Maglich proposed "the principle of self colliding orbits" and the perceptron, a self-colliding particle beam accelerator originally proposed for studying pion-pion collisions. Shortly thereafter, in the early 1970s, the perceptron design formed the basis for Maglich's "migmatron" concept of a self-colliding ion beam fusion reactor.

Business ventures

In his attempts to raise funding for his magma research, Maglich has been associated with a string of business ventures. In 1974, he formed MIGMA Institute of High Energy Fusion, Fusion Energy Corp. From 1985 to 1987, he was CEO and principal investigator of Aneutronic Energy Labs of United Sciences, Inc. at Princeton, a research firm also known as AELabs. It was during this time that Maglich worked under a research grant from the United States Air Force to attempt to develop his migmatron concept into a compact power source for spacecraft with Bechtel Corp. From 1988 to 1993, he was CEO of Advanced Physics Corporation, chaired by

Glenn T. Seaborg Glenn Theodore Seaborg (; April 19, 1912February 25, 1999) was an American chemist whose involvement in the synthesis, discovery and investigation of ten transuranium elements earned him a share of the 1951 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. His work i ...

. In 1995, Maglich founded HiEnergy Microdevices, which later became HiEnergy Technologies, Inc., a developer and manufacturer of neutron-based bomb detection equipment based on his invention of "atometery". He continued to occupy various positions with that company until being terminated for cause. Sixteen months after Maglich's departure, HiEnergy Technologies declared bankruptcy in 2007.HiEnergy Technologies, Inc. Announces Decision to Seek Bankruptcy Protection to Address Financial and Operational Challenges
/ref> After leaving HiEnergy Technologies, Maglich became the chief technology officer of California Science & Engineering Corporation (CALSEC).

Personal life

The son of a lawyer and elected member of the Yugoslav Royal Parliament, Maglich (at age 13) and his mother were imprisoned in a Croatian

Ustaše The Ustaše (), also known by anglicised versions Ustasha or Ustashe, was a Croatian fascist and ultranationalist organization active, as one organization, between 1929 and 1945, formally known as the Ustaša – Croatian Revolutionary Move ...

(Nazi-affiliated) concentration camp for Serbs, but managed to escape. Maglich has five children: Angelica (born 1989) and Aleksandra Maglich (born 1991), from a prior marriage to UCLA media artist

Victoria Vesna Victoria Vesna (born 1959) is a professor and digital media artist. She is known for her feminist video, computer and internet art and has been active since the early 1980s. Along with collaborator Jim Gimzewski she is thought to have created one ...

; also Marko (born 1960), Ivanka (born 1961) and Roberta (born 1972).

References

External links

"Science: Nature's Onion"
''

Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, ...

''. September 15, 1961.
"Company Interview: Bogdan Maglich: HiEnergy Technologies, Inc."
''

The Wall Street Transcript ''The Wall Street Transcript'' is a paid subscription publication and Web site that publishes bi-weekly industry reports that feature equity analyst, money manager and CEO interviews. Reports typically cover two to three industries and express ...

''. January 9, 2006.
"Visionary Physicist's Crusade Serves As Lesson In Futility"
'' The Scientist''. November 27, 1989. 3 (23): 1. *Maglich, Bogdan (January 20, 1990)
"Letter: Migma Omissions"
''The Scientist''. * {{DEFAULTSORT:Maglich, Bogdan 1928 births 2017 deaths American physicists Serbian physicists Yugoslav emigrants to the United States University of Belgrade Faculty of Physics alumni Yugoslav physicists People from Sombor People associated with CERN Yugoslav expatriates in the United Kingdom