Edward Hutchinson Synge

Edward Hutchinson Synge (1 June 1890 – 26 May 1957) was an Irish physicist who published a complete theoretical description of the near-field scanning optical microscope, an instrument used in nanotechnology, several decades before it was experimentally developed. He never completed university yet did significant original research in both microscopy and telescopy.^[1] He was the first to apply the principle of scanning in imaging, which later became important in a wide range of technologies including television, radar, and scanning electron microscopy.^[2][3] He was the older brother of distinguished mathematician and theoretical physicist John Lighton Synge.^[1]