Paul Harrison Dike (February 22, 1878, Crystal Lake, Illinois – June 25, 1956, Jenkintown, Pennsylvania)[1] was an American physicist who did research on terrestrial magnetism, atmospheric electricity, photoelectricity, pyrometry, and radiation theory.
Following instructions from the Carnegie Institution's Director of the Department of Terrestrial Magnetism, Dike joined the magnetic survey yacht Galilee at Sitka, Alaska near the beginning of August 1907 and performed experimental observations of atmospheric electriticy during the 1907–1908 voyage in the Pacific Ocean.
His Ph.D. thesis "Photo-Electric Potentials of Thin Cathode Films" was published in Physical Review(Series I) 34, 459 – June 1, 1912.
During WW I on an academic leave of absence, he served from August 18, 1917 to 1919 as a lieutenant in the U.S. Army Signal Corps.
Their first son, William Gordon Dike became a physicist who worked in Oak Ridge, Tennessee on the atomic bomb project during World War II.