Lawrenson was born in
Prescot,
Lancashire, and educated at the
University of Manchester from which he held the degrees of
BSc,
MSc and
DSc. From 1956 to 1961 he was a research engineer at
GEC. His early published activities include work on linear electrical machines with
Eric Laithwaite, in which the linear induction motor was considered as a propulsion means for the shuttle in textile weaving machines. In 1961 Lawrenson was appointed a
Lecturer in
Electrical Engineering at the
University of Leeds, from where his publications show growing interest in reluctance machines - initially AC-fed synchronous reluctance motors and later doubly-salient synchronous machines such as stepper motors (resulting in numerous further publications throughout the 1970s, often co-authored with research students and colleagues including Austin Hughes, Michael Stephenson, Paul Acarnley, Philip Blenkinsop, Norman Fulton and Jasmin Corda, to name but some of his co-workers). The first seminal paper on switched reluctance machines was published in 1980. He remained at Leeds for 30 years, being promoted to
Reader in 1965 and
Professor of
Electrical Engineering in 1966. He retired from his chair in 1991 with the title
Emeritus Professor, in order to devote his full-time attention to the growing business he had co-founded in Leeds, Switched Reluctance Drives Ltd. Lawrenson is considered the father of the
switched reluctance motor and associated drive technology. == References ==