David R. Clarke is the inaugural holder of the Extended Tarr Family Professor of Materials in the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. He holds a PhD in Physics from the University of Cambridge, a B.Sc. in Applied Sciences from Sussex University and was awarded a ScD from the University of Cambridge.

A member of the National Academy of Engineering since 1999, he is also a Fellow of both the American Physical Society and the American Ceramic Society, and received an Alexander von Humboldt Foundation Senior Scientist Award in 1993.

 He shared the 2008 Japanese NIMS Award for Recent Breakthroughs in Materials Science for Energy and Environment, is a Distinguished Life Member of the American Ceramic Society and was recently listed as author of one of the 11 best papers in the 110 years of publications on ceramics and glasses.  

 His long-term interests in materials range from the fundamentals to the applied, from ceramics to metals to semiconductors and polymers. He has published over 450 papers in areas of materials ranging from thermal barrier coatings, to dielectric elastomers to fundamentals of oxidation to microelectronics reliability and the electrical and optical properties of ZnO and GaN. 

At Harvard, he enjoys interacting with students at all levels, from teaching Freshman seminars on “Glass” and  “Materials, Energy and Society”, graduate courses in composites and deformation of materials and the new undergraduate course in SEAS on “Fundamentals of Heat Transfer”, a required course for students studying Mechanical Engineering.

Assistant:  Jane Salant, jsalant@harvard.edu, tel. 617-496-8119

Teaching

Undergraduate Courses

Engineering Sciences, ES 192. "Materials Selection and Design". Fall Semester

Engineering Sciences, ES 183. “Heat Transfer”. Spring Semester

(previously) Freshman Seminar 50C.  "The Art, Science and Technology of Glass".  Fall Semester.

Graduate Courses

AP 294. Dislocations and Deformation

AP 294X. Composite Materials