International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 49 (2006) 1–2
www.elsevier.com/locate/ijhmt

In Memoriam

Professor James P. Hartnett (1924–2005)

It is with profound sorrow and an unfathomable senseof loss that we note the passing of Professor James P. Hartnett on September 1, 2005. Professor Hartnett was one of
the towering giants who, in the latter half of the twentiethcentury, transformed the ﬁeld of heat transfer from ascattering of individual practitioners to a world-wide community. This journal takes particular pride in his achievements and is especially impacted by his passing becauseProfessor Hartnett was one of its founders. Indeed, during
the early years of the Journal, he was the dynamo that provided the motive power for its dynamic rise to the highest
levels of international prestige.
James Patrick Hartnett was born in Lynn, Massachusetts, a suburb of Boston, on March 19, 1924. He did his
undergraduate work at the Illinois Institute of Technology
and then went on to obtain a masterÕs degree at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. At MIT, he studied withProfessor Warren Rohsenow, who become a major ﬁgure
in subsequent decades. His doctoral work was performedat the University of California at Berkeley and completed
under the guidance of Professor Ralph Seban, one of themost active heat transfer researchers of the time.
After obtaining his doctoral degree, Professor Hartnett
joined the faculty of the mechanical engineering departdoi:10.1016/j.ijheatmasstransfer.2005.10.024

ment at the University of Minnesota. This was an auspicious move because it coincided with the founding anddevelopment of the most productive heat transfer laboratory of the mid-to-late twentieth century. The laboratory
was directed by Professor Ernst Eckert, the towering heattransfer ﬁgure of the era, and the collaboration of Professors Hartnett and Eckert, started at that time, continued
during their respective lifetimes.
In 1960, Professor Hartnett, by that time a mature researcher, undertook his ﬁrst leadership role by accepting
the chairmanship of mechanical engineering at the University of Delaware. There, he energized the development oflaboratories and research facilities. In 1965, he accepted
an even greater challenge. In that year, the University ofIllinois opened a new campus in the city of Chicago. The
new university implemented a novel concept in engineering
education by abolishing the traditional disciplinary departments. Professor Hartnett was a leader in breathing life
into that concept.
In 1974, he accepted still another challenge in creating
the Energy Resources Center at the University of Illinois.
Concurrent with this activity, he has served, by appointment of the Illinois legislature, as the secretary of theIllinois Energy Resources Commission which advised the2

In Memoriam / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 49 (2006) 1–2

legislature on energy matters. He was often called upon fortestimony and advice on energy questions by the US Congress and by state and federal government agencies.
In 1998, he retired from the directorship of the Energy
Resources Center and from the University.
His many years as a university professor have netted arich harvest of research. He has made major contributions
to the permanent literature in the areas of liquid metal heattransfer, mass transfer cooling, and in heat transfer in nonNewtonian ﬂuids. Besides these main themes, he has worked
broadly in areas of heat transfer as diverse as thermal radiation, conduction, duct ﬂows, and impingement ﬂows. All
told, the fruits of his research have yielded 180 papers.
Not only has he made an important mark in research,
but he has also made unparalleled contributions to thedevelopment of an international heat transfer community
and to the founding and management of publication vehicles for heat transfer information.
Professor Hartnett is widely acknowledged as being
both the architect and the builder of the international heattransfer community. It was he, who for the ﬁrst time,
secured the breakthroughs which opened up channels ofcommunication between the thermal scientists of the former Soviet Union and those of the Western Countries. Itwas also through his eﬀorts that the Assembly for International Heat Transfer Conferences was established. He also
played a leading role in the formation of the International
Center for Heat and Mass Transfer and its continuing
activities.
He has served on advisory committees and also as a consultant on research and educational activities in the former
Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, Southeast Asia, and Korea.
In addition, he has been a visiting professor at the University of Tokyo, the University of Alexandria, and the Israel
Institute of Technology. In 1980, he was invited by the Chinese Academy of Sciences to visit the PeopleÕs Republic ofChina and to present lectures at the Institute of Engineering Thermophysics and at several universities.
In 1995, Professor Hartnett was elected Honorary Member of the Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers, elected
Foreign Fellow of the Indian National Academy of Engineering, and was named the ﬁrst Dr. Arcot Ramachandran
Chaired Professor of Heat Transfer at the IIT—Madras. In
1998, he was honored by being designated as the ﬁrst UIC
Distinguished Professor of the College of Engineering.

His contributions to the dissemination of information tothe heat transfer community are of enormous scope. Hewas the prime mover in the founding and later in the development of the International Journal of Heat and MassTransfer, the preeminent journal in the ﬁeld, InternationalCommunications in Heat and Mass Transfer, and several
other journals. In addition, he was the founding editor ofthe very successful Advances in Heat Transfer series. TheHandbook of Heat Transfer, now in its third edition, wasanother of his editing achievements.
In recognition of his numerous signiﬁcant contributions,many honors have been bestowed on Professor Hartnett.
He has been the recipient of the A.V. Luikov Medal ofthe International Centre for Heat and Mass Transfer, theASME Heat Transfer Memorial Award, the Max Jakob
Award of AIChE and ASME, and the ASME Heat Transfer Division 50th Anniversary Award. He was also therecipient of a Fulbright Award, a Guggenheim Fellowshipand the Professional Achievement Award from his Alma
Mater, the Illinois Institute of Technology.
The multiple and unique facets of Professor HartnettÕs
long and distinguished career have marked him as a towering ﬁgure in the international community of heat transfer
scholars. With profound respect, we pay him due homage
for all his extraordinary achievements.
W.J. Minkowycz
University of Illinois at Chicago,
Department of Mechanical Engineering (M/C 251),
842 West Taylor Street,
Room 2049 ERF,
Chicago, IL 60607-7022,
United States
Tel.: +1 312 996 3467; fax: +1 312 413 0447
E-mail address: wjm@uic:edu
E.M. Sparrow
R.J. Goldstein
W.M. Rohsenow
D.B. Spalding
W. Begell
R.M. Szandra
W.M. Worek
Y.I. Cho
Available online 5 December 2005