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NOBEL LAUREATE WALTER KOHN TO GIVE PUBLIC LECTURE AT UCSD ON MARCH 4

Walter Kohn, the 1998 Nobel Prize winner in chemistry, will give a free public lecture at the University of California, San Diego on March 4.

A physics professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara, Kohn was awarded the 1998 Nobel Prize for his leading role in the development of density-functional theory, which has revolutionized scientists’ approach to the electronic structure of atoms, molecules and solid materials in physics, chemistry and materials science. With the density-functional theory and the power of supercomputers, scientists can more easily "see" into the atomic structure of matter.

Density-functional theory is a reformulation of quantum mechanics that makes possible the efficient calculation of electronic properties in many electron systems. The density-functional theory carries importance in a broad range of properties in condensed matter physics and quantum chemistry.

Kohn conducted early research on the theory at UCSD. As one of UCSD’s first faculty members and a founding father of UCSD’s Physics Department, Kohn influenced the early direction of the university and its physics department. Kohn served as chair of the UCSD Physics Department from 1961 to 1963 and chair of the Campus Academic Senate in 1968-1969. Kohn also is credited as the founding father of UCSD’s Judaic Studies Program.

An author of more than 200 scientific articles and reviews, he has made major contributions to the physics of semiconductors, superconductivity and surface physics.

Kohn’s March 4 lecture, "Electronic Structure of Matter - Wave Functions and Density Functionals," will be held at 4 p.m. in the auditorium of the Robinson Building Complex, UCSD’s International Relations and Pacific Studies.

Born in Vienna, Austria in 1923, Kohn received bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Toronto. He received a Ph.D. in physics from Harvard University in 1948. He was a physics instructor at Harvard from 1948-1950 and at Carnegie Mellon University from 1950-1960. He was a professor in UCSD’s Physics Department from 1960-1979. In 1979 Kohn became the first director of the Institute for Theoretical Physics at UC Santa Barbara.