Herman Feshbach | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | 2 February 1917 New York City, U.S. |
| Died | 22 December 2000 (aged 83) Cambridge, Massachusetts, U.S. |
| Alma mater | City College of New York,Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| Known for | Feshbach resonance |
| Awards | Guggenheim Fellowship,National Medal of Science,Tom W. Bonner Prize in Nuclear Physics,Fellow of the American Physical Society |
| Scientific career | |
| Institutions | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| Thesis | The theory of hydrogen three (1942) |
| Doctoral students | Robert Louis Pease |
Herman Feshbach (2 February 1917 – 22 December 2000) was an American physicist. He was an Institute Professor Emeritus of physics at theMassachusetts Institute of Technology. Feshbach is best known forFeshbach resonance and for writing, withPhilip M. Morse,Methods of Theoretical Physics.[1]
Feshbach was born inNew York City and graduated from theCity College of New York in 1937. He was a member of the same family asMurray Feshbach, theSovietologist and retired Georgetown University professor. He then went on to receive his Ph.D. inphysics fromMIT in 1942.[2] Feshbach attended theShelter Island Conference of 1947.
Feshbach was invited to stay at MIT after he received his doctorate. He remained on the physics faculty for over fifty years. From 1967 to 1973, he was the director of MIT'sCenter for Theoretical Physics, and from 1973 to 1983, he was chairman of the physics department. In 1983, Feshbach was named as an institute professor, the highest faculty honor at MIT.
Feshbach was active in thenuclear disarmament movement and was a founder and first chairman of theUnion of Concerned Scientists. In 1969, he participated in a protest against military research at MIT.
He became concerned about the condition of scientists behind theIron Curtain, and worked to establish contacts between Western scientists and theirEastern Bloc counterparts. Prof. Feshbach also championed the cause ofAndrei Sakharov and other Sovietrefuseniks. He first met Sakharov in the mid-1970s; Feshbach wrote about meeting Sakharov after his release from internal exile, in an article that appeared inPhysics Today.[3]
Feshbach was a strong believer in equality of opportunity, especially within the scientific community. He worked to increase the number of women and minority members in both the physics department and at MIT in general. In the early 1990s, he was chairman of the MIT faculty's Equal Opportunity Committee, which made recommendations for recruiting and hiring more women and minority faculty members.
Feshbach died of heart failure at Youville Hospital inCambridge. He was 83.
Feshbach joined theNational Academy of Sciences in 1969 and was president of theAmerican Physical Society from 1980 to 1981. From 1982 to 1986, he was president of theAmerican Academy of Arts and Sciences.
In 1986, Feshbach was awarded theNational Medal of Science.
In 1984, the physics department honored Feshbach for his decades of service by starting the annual Herman Feshbach Lectures. The physics department also has an endowed Herman Feshbach chair, established in 1999 to support theoretical physicists. It is currently held byFrank Wilczek.
The American Physical Society awards theHerman Feshbach Prize in Theoretical Nuclear Physics; it is awarded annually and was inaugurated in 2014.
