Peter George Le Comber FRS FRSE (19 February 1941 – 9 September 1992) was a British solid-state physicist and academic. With ten patents to his name, he is in part responsible for the development of items such as flat-screen televisions and solar power cells.[1] He worked closely with Walter Eric Spear FRS in the development of Amorphous silicon and the creation of solar panels.
He was born in Ilford, Essex on 19 February 1941.[1] His father was largely absent during his early years, serving in the Middle East during the Second World War. He attended Becontree Heath Primary School. Following a scholarship at age eleven,[2] he studied at South East Essex Technical College and then Leicester University, graduating BSc in 1962 and then undertaking a Ph.D. From 1965 to 1967 he conducted studies at Purdue UniversityinIndiana, USA. In 1967 he returned to Leicester University as a lecturer in Physics.[1]
He met Walter Eric Spear whilst working in Leicester and together they went to the Carnegie Laboratory of Physics, Dundee University in 1969 to establish the study of non-crystalline solids.[3][4] In 1984 he was the recipient of the Duddell Medal.[5] In 1984 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh and in 1992, shortly before his death, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of London.[1]
In 1986 Dundee University created a personal chair in Solid State Physics for him, placing the university in a critical position in the development of semiconductors.[6]
He died of a heart attack on 9 September 1992, whilst on a trip to Switzerland to celebrate his thirtieth wedding anniversary. As a close personal friend, Spear wrote his obituary. Spear's own research career was effectively ended by LeComber's sudden death.[4]
He married Joy Smith around 1963.[1]
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