Robert Wolfgang Cahn FRS (9 September 1924 – 9 April 2007) was a British metallurgist whose contributions to physical metallurgy centred on the properties of dislocations.
Cahn developed a successful model for the nucleation of recrystallisation, which underpinned research into industrial processes involving high-temperature deformation.
His turbulent childhood undoubtedly had an influence on the determination with which he approached his professional life, "his legendary impatience",[4] and his wide cultural interests.
Young Robert was raised in a flat in the centre of Fürth, and for three years in a modernist style house on the outskirts.
In July 1933, his father's marriage to Else being on the point of collapse and the children having been persecuted on account of their being Jewish, the family fled to Switzerland from where Robert went with his mother and grandfather to Majorca and Martin to London to establish a new business.
Following a brief interlude in London, he escaped the Blitz to Workington, Cumbria where he had two years of excellent teaching at the local technical school[5] and discovered a lifelong passion for mountain walking.
From the moment he left Germany until his naturalisation in 1947, he was a stateless person and this had a major psychological influence on him and fuelled his desire to achieve and integrate in his new homeland.
Paradoxically his life experience had developed in him wide, very continental, cultural tastes, and extensive international contacts and his travels across Europe resulted in a fluency in four languages.
Consultations with Alan Cottrell at Birmingham had confirmed that this arrangement was to be expected on theoretical grounds if dislocations existed.
However, as the only person undertaking fundamental research,at Harwell, Cahn felt isolated and in 1951 he moved to Birmingham to the Department of his father in law, Daniel Hanson.
He says in his memoirs[2] that he regarded the years he devoted to creating this journal as the most important single editorial role he played.
In 1986 Cahn, Haasen and Edward Kramer started work on a new series of multi-authored books, "Materials Science and Technology: A Comprehensive Treatment" which eventually contained 20 volumes, republished in 2005.
Despite his very specialised expertise, Cahn was an intellectual polymath of the old school who pushed hard for the integration of scientific and artistic skills.