Martin Wood (engineer)

Sir Martin Francis Wood, CBE, FRS, HonFREng (born 19 April 1927) is a British engineer and entrepreneur. He co-founded Oxford Instruments, one of the first spin-out companies from the University of Oxford and still one of the most successful.

He was educated at Gresham's School, Holt and Trinity College, Cambridge University, where he read engineering, and Imperial College, London. From 1955 to 1969, he was a Senior Research Officer at the Clarendon Laboratory at the University of Oxford. He used the knowledge he acquired on high field magnets to form Oxford Instruments, which had a pioneering role in the development of magnetic resonance imaging.

Sir Martin and his wife, Audrey, have many philanthropic achievements, including donating £2m for the building of the Sir Martin Wood Lecture Theatre at the Clarendon Laboratory. He also founded the Earth Trust to promote nature conservation at Little Wittenham and the Wittenham Clumps, and the Sylva Foundation to support sustainable forest management. In 2005, Oxford Innovation, a company also founded by Sir Martin Wood, launched the Martin and Audrey Wood Enterprise Awards for entrepreneurship ([1]).

Martin Wood was knighted by the Queen at Buckingham Palace in 1986. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1987, is a recipient of the Order of the Rising Sun, and has received honorary degrees from eight British universities.

Honours

• Honorary doctorate from Oxford University
• Royal Society Mullard Award
• Fellow of the Royal Society
• Commander of the Order of the British Empire
• Order of the Rising Sun
• Knighthood
• Honorary Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering in 1994

Further reading

• Audrey Wood — Magnetic Venture: The Story of Oxford Instruments (Oxford University Press, 2001). ISBN 0-19-924108-2.

External links

• Oxford Instruments plc
• Honorary degrees: University of Oxford Annual Review 2003–4
• Martin and Audrey Wood Enterprise Awards
• Sylva Foundation
• Oxford Innovation