Crighton, David George

(1942-2000), applied mathematician and fluid dynamicist

by H. K. Moffatt

© Oxford University Press 2004 All rights reserved

Crighton, David George (1942-2000), applied mathematician and fluid dynamicist, was born on 15 November 1942 in the Maternity Home, Oxford Road, Llandudno, Caernarvonshire, the elder child of George Wolfe Johnston Crighton (1899-1976), a civil servant in the stamp duty office, and his wife, Violet Grace, née Garrison (b. 1912). His sister, Frances, was born in 1946. David was educated at the primary school in Abbots Langley to the age of eleven, then at Watford Boys' Grammar School from 1953 to 1961. He studied a broad range of subjects including modern languages and classics, eventually concentrating on mathematics, spurred on, as he used to enjoy relating in later life, by a schoolmaster who said that it was the one subject in which he would not succeed. He was an all-rounder at school, captain of rugby, an enthusiastic runner and cyclist, and head boy in his final year.

Crighton read mathematics as an undergraduate of St John's College, Cambridge, from 1961 to 1964. He achieved first-class honours in part two (1964) of the mathematical tripos. The course offered a broad range of options in pure and applied mathematics, and Crighton specialized on the applied side, and particularly on the courses involving the dynamics of fluids. He could have continued with part three mathematics, the normal route to research and an academic career, but chose instead to leave Cambridge to take a job as a lecturer at Woolwich Polytechnic (later the University of Greenwich). The teaching load was heavy, and at a fairly basic level; after two years, however, he was taken on as a research assistant at Imperial College, London, by John Ffowcs Williams (later professor of engineering at the University of Cambridge and master of Emmanuel College, Cambridge). He worked with Ffowcs Williams on the effect of bubbles on the propagation of sound through water in turbulent motion, a problem of great importance for the US Navy which supported the research. The work was published in 1969, and Crighton received his PhD degree in the same year.

Within a further five years, continuing at Imperial College, Crighton had written or co-authored a series of sixteen influential papers on jet noise, the scattering of sound waves, acoustic beaming and reflection from wave-bearing surfaces, and related topics. The need to control engine noise during take-off and landing of the supersonic aircraft Concorde made this research urgent. Crighton's involvement in the Concorde research team of that period is described in detail by Ffowcs Williams (Williams, 'Commentary').

Crighton's subsequent research remained within the broad field of aero- and hydro-acoustics and wave theory; he was a pioneer in studies of the generation of sound and vibration by underwater structures (important in naval architecture and for submarine detection); of intense sound waves, as generated by supersonic aircraft, and the manner in which shock waves develop when these sound waves propagate over large distances; and of the phenomenon of Anderson localization, whereby wave disturbances in the neighbourhood of periodic structures can remain trapped near the region of excitation.

On 2 March 1968 Crighton married Mary Christine West, a professional musician, with whom he shared a passion for music and opera, and whom he had first met at the Bayreuth Festival in 1964. Their son, Ben, was born in 1970, their daughter, Beth, in 1971. In 1974, at the early age of thirty-three, Crighton was appointed to the chair of applied mathematics at Leeds (previously held by T. G. Cowling); there his organizational and administrative talents were soon evident. The department, which in 1974 was modest in its achievements and expectations, was transformed under his influence over the next twelve years into one of the top three or four departments of its kind in the country. Crighton's successive spells as head of department, chairman of school, and chairman of the science board, left in every case indelible marks of his imagination and effectiveness, tough decisions being invariably coupled with a caring interest in those individuals affected.

In 1985 Crighton's marriage was dissolved, and on 6 September 1986 he married Johanna Veronica Kooij, née Hol, an independent education consultant from the Netherlands, whom he had met some years earlier. In that same year he was elected professor of applied mathematics at the University of Cambridge. Here his boundless energy and talents found full scope. In 1991 he became head of the department of applied mathematics and theoretical physics and immediately took steps to establish new professorships, first in the rapidly emerging field of nonlinear dynamics, and then in the field of solid mechanics. The department continued to flourish under his inspired leadership. He played a key role in planning the move of the two departments of the Cambridge faculty of mathematics from their antiquated buildings on the Old Press site in the centre of town to the new Centre for Mathematical Sciences in west Cambridge (a move finally completed in 2002, two years after his death), and in the massive fund-raising campaign that this entailed.

From 1979 Crighton had been an associate editor of the Journal of Fluid Mechanics, the premier international journal of the subject. This was a position of great exposure, involving an immense correspondence with contributors from all over the world; from 1996, he gradually took over the editorship from the founding editor, G. K. Batchelor, whose health was failing. Crighton was elected to fellowship of the Royal Society in 1993, and for two years (1994-6) took on the additional burden of editing the Proceedings (A) of the Royal Society. Within Cambridge, Crighton was a fellow of St John's College from 1986 until his appointment as master of Jesus College in 1997. In this latter role, as in his role as head of the department of applied mathematics and theoretical physics, he governed with consummate diplomatic skill, great good humour, and a selfless concern for the members and staff of the college at all levels.

Crighton was widely respected outside Britain: he was president of the European Mechanics Society until 1997, and then continued to serve as vice-president. He was elected a member of Academia Europeae in 1999, in recognition as much for his services to European science as for his own considerable achievements in research. Institutions in the US and Europe awarded him medals and honorary doctorates.

Outside science, David Crighton's enduring passion was for the operas of Wagner, on which he became an authority. He never missed an opportunity to attend the Bayreuth Festival, and would always seek to incorporate at least one opera in each of his many lecturing engagements around the world. A final achievement that gave him great personal satisfaction just a few weeks before his death was to conduct his college orchestra in a moving performance of the overture to Tannhäuser. His infectious enthusiasm, and the twinkle in his eye, were endearing for all who worked with him.

Crighton died of cancer at Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge, on 12 April 2000, aged fifty-seven, following fifteen months of illness which he endured with great courage, relinquishing none of his heavy responsibilities. He was cremated at Cambridge crematorium following a service in Jesus College chapel. A memorial service was held at Great St Mary's, Cambridge. His early death was a shock for the worldwide community of fluid dynamics, of which he had been an influential and greatly respected member.

H. K. MOFFATT

Sources  
H. E. Huppert and N. Peake, Memoirs FRS, 47 (2001)
J. F. Williams, 'David Crighton, 1942-2000: a commentary on his career and his influence on aeroacoustic theory', Journal of Fluid Mechanics, 437 (2001), 1-11
The Times (19 April 2000)
G. I. Barenblatt, 'George Keith Batchelor (1920-2000) and David George Crighton (1942-2000), applied mathematicians', Notices of the American Mathematical Society, 48/8 (2001), 800-06
WW (2000), 471
CGPLA Eng. & Wales (2000)
b. cert.
m. certs.

Likenesses  
L. Riley-Smith, oils, 1999, Jesus College, Cambridge; copy, department of applied mathematics and theoretical physics, U. Cam.

Wealth at death  
£192,013--net £189,935: probate, 2000


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