Gene F. Franklin (July 25, 1927 – August 9, 2012) was an American electrical engineer and

control theorist Control may refer to: Basic meanings Economics and business * Control (management), an element of management * Control, an element of management accounting * Comptroller (or controller), a senior financial officer in an organization * Controlling ...

known for his pioneering work towards the advancement of the

control systems engineering Control engineering or control systems engineering is an engineering discipline that deals with control systems, applying control theory to design equipment and systems with desired behaviors in control environments. The discipline of controls o ...

– a subfield of electrical engineering. Most of his work on

control theory Control theory is a field of mathematics that deals with the control of dynamical systems in engineered processes and machines. The objective is to develop a model or algorithm governing the application of system inputs to drive the system to a ...

was adapted immediately into

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's U.S. space program, most famously in the control systems for the

Apollo missions The Apollo program was a United States human spaceflight program carried out from 1961 to 1972 by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), which landed the first astronauts on the Moon. The program used the Saturn IB and Saturn ...

to the

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in 1960s–1970s. He is also noted for his authorship of influential texts on the control system, most notably, ''Feedback Control of Dynamic Systems'', which has been translated into numerous of languages and has received literary prizes as the best book in the discipline of controls.

Early life

Franklin was born in

Banner Elk Banner Elk is a town in Avery County, North Carolina, United States. The population was 1,028 at the 2010 census. Banner Elk is home to Lees–McRae College. History The area surrounding the Elk River was inhabited by the Cherokee before weste ...

North Carolina North Carolina () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the 28th largest and 9th-most populous of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Georgia and ...

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, on July 25, 1927. His father was a professor of mathematics at the local college, and his mother was a

nurse Nursing is a profession within the health care sector focused on the care of individuals, families, and communities so they may attain, maintain, or recover optimal health and quality of life. Nurses may be differentiated from other health c ...

, an RN at the local hospital.

Military career

Franklin joined the

United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...

in 1945, serving in

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

, and was assigned to Navy's radar systems. He lost his enthusiasm for the navy after

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Truman's decision of

atomic bombings The United States detonated two atomic bombs over the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki on 6 and 9 August 1945, respectively. The two bombings killed between 129,000 and 226,000 people, most of whom were civilians, and remain the onl ...

of Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. He took a transfer to study electronics and taught a course on electronics at the Great Lakes Naval Training Center.

Education

Franklin took a discharge from the navy on medical grounds and joined Georgia Institute of Technology. He received his Bachelor of Science, B.S. degree in electrical engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology in 1950, his Master of Science, M.S. in electrical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1952, and his Doctor of Engineering, D.E. Science, Sc. degree from Columbia University in 1955. Franklin's 1958 doctoral thesis “''Sampled-Data Control Systems''” (co-authored by Franklin's dissertation advisor, John R. Ragazzini) introduced digital control to a discipline which had previously operated almost exclusively in the analog domain. This breakthrough allowed control systems to become much more precise and reliable.

Teaching career

He taught at Columbia University from 1955 to 1957 before moving to Stanford University, where he was professor emeritus of electrical engineering until his death in August 2012. His research encompassed all aspects of control incorporating digital logic, including adaptive control of both nonlinear systems and systems with multiple-data sampling. He was a recipient of the Richard E. Bellman Control Heritage Award in 2005 for "fundamental contributions to the theory and practice of digital, modern, adaptive, and multivariable control".

Death

On August 9, 2012, he died at Stanford Hospital in Palo Alto at the age of 85.Gene F. Franklin, professor emeritus of electrical engineering, dies at 85
, ''Stanford University School of Engineering''

Notes

External links

AACC page
{{DEFAULTSORT:Franklin, Gene F. 1927 births 2012 deaths American electrical engineers Control theorists Georgia Tech alumni Richard E. Bellman Control Heritage Award recipients NASA people United States Navy officers Columbia School of Engineering and Applied Science alumni Massachusetts Institute of Technology alumni