Sound and Vibration (MWL)

When in 1974 the industrialist Marcus Wallenberg retired as chairman for Atlas-Copco the board of directors decided to honour him by a donation to KTH in the name of Marcus Wallenberg. The donation would constitute the economic foundation for a new department, the first of its kind in Sweden, in the field of sound and vibration and machinery acoustics.

The Department of Technical Acoustics was started 1977 and the first holder of the chair was Göran Gadefelt. In the early 1980's the department had a staff of 5 people. In 1987 the professor chair was taken over by Anders Nilsson. In 1993 the Technical Acoustics was merged with the divisions of Naval Architecture, Railway Technology and Vehicle Engineering to form the Department of Vehicle Engineering. At the same time Technical Acoustics received a donation from The Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation for the building of new laboratory facilities, establishing The Marcus Wallenberg Laboratory for Sound and Vibration Research (MWL). The new laboratory offering unique experimental facilities was inaugurated in March 1997.

Today MWL is part of the Department of Engineering Mechanics and has grown to become the largest university centre for sound and vibration research in Scandinavia, with four full time professors and a total staff at around 35.