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Abstract

Werner Goldsmith, one of the foremost authorities on the mechanics of impact and the biomechanics of head and neck injuries, died peacefully at home in Oakland, California, on August 23, 2003, at age 79 after a short, courageous battle with leukemia, ending a long and very distinguished career in mechanics, dynamics, and biomechanics, and an almost six-decades-long association with the University of California, Berkeley. He was one of the pioneering, eminent solid and fluid mechanicians who made an early transition to biomechanics, and in rising to equal distinction in their new fields, added great credibility to biomechanics as a discipline in its own right. He was also a distinguished and influential figure in bioengineering education at his own institution, and, more broadly, in the United States and abroad. An emeritus professor for over a decade, he continued to be active in research and teaching until the very last days of his life.