Richard Newland Dixon (25 December 1930—25 May 2021) FRS was a British chemist noted for his work in the field of thermal or optical properties of matter.

[1] He was born in Borough Green, Kent the son of Robert T and Lilian Dixon He was educated at The Judd School, King's College London (BSc, 1951) and at St Catharine's College, Cambridge (PhD, 1955).

[2] He married Alison Birks in 1954.

[3] From 1969, his career was based at the University of Bristol, starting as Chair of Theoretical Chemistry.

He was elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 1986[4] and awarded the Rumford Medal in 2004.