Walter Kohn

<html> <head> <title>Walter Kohn</title> <meta name="googlebot" content="noodp"> <meta name="robots" content="noodp"> <link rel="apple-touch-icon-precomposed" href="/silly-nndb-icon.png" /><style type="text/css">  </style></head> <body bgcolor=#ffffff> <center> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0><tr><td valign=top><table width=550 cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0><tr><td bgcolor=white><table width="100%" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" background="/nndb.gif"> <tr> <td rowspan="2" align="left" valign="top"><a href="http://www.nndb.com/"><img src="/title.gif" width="260" height="50" border=0 alt="NNDB"></a></td> <td><table width="100%" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="6"> <tr align="center"> <td width="25%" nowrap>This is a beta version of NNDB</td> </tr> </table></td> </tr> <tr> <td align="right" valign="middle"> <form action="http://search.nndb.com/search/nndb.cgi" method="get"> <input type="hidden" name="nndb" value="1"></input> Search: <select name="omenu"> <option value="unspecified" selected>All Names</option> <option value="living">Living people</option> <option value="dead">Dead people</option> <option value="bands">Band Names</option> <option value="books">Book Titles</option> <option value="movies">Movie Titles</option> <option value="fulltext">Full Text</option> </select> for <input name="query" value="" size=24 maxlength=96> <input type=submit value="Search"> </form></td> </tr> </table>        </td></tr><tr><td bgcolor=red height=2></td></tr><map name=fool><area coords="102,0,240,14" href="/people/836/000100536/bibliography/" alt="bibliography"></map><tr bgcolor=F0F0F0><td bgcolor=F0F0F0 style="padding: 0px 15px 15px 15px;"><img src="/red-profile-2.gif" align="right" height=15 width=240 border=0 usemap=#fool> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 width=100%><tr><td bgcolor=F0F0F0>Walter Kohn<img src="walter-kohn-1-sized.jpg" height=334 width=230 align=right hspace=10 vspace=10 alt="Walter Kohn">AKA Walter Samuel Gerst KohnBorn: <a href="/lists/586/000106268/" class=proflink>9-Mar</a>-<a href="/lists/922/000105607/" class=proflink>1923</a> Birthplace: <a href="/geo/826/000069619/" class=proflink>Vienna, Austria</a> Died: <a href="/lists/993/000106675/" class=proflink>19-Apr</a>-<a href="/lists/166/000399963/" class=proflink>2016</a> Cause of death: unspecified Gender: Male Religion: <a href="/lists/875/000071662/" class=proflink>Jewish</a> Race or Ethnicity: White Sexual orientation: Straight Occupation: <a href="/lists/627/000096339/" class=proflink>Chemist</a> Party Affiliation: DemocraticNationality: United States Executive summary: Density-functional theoryMilitary service: Canadian Army (Infantry Corps, 1944-45)The parents of condensed matter theorist Walter Kohn were killed in Hitler's Holocaust, after they sent their teenaged son to safety in England. Because of his German passport, however, young Kohn was held in internment camps as World War II raged, first on the Isle of Man and later in Canada. He later studied at the University of Toronto, and came to America to find work as a physicist. In 1964 he developed density-functional theory in quantum chemistry, superseding previous theorems that required data on the motion of every individual electron in a molecule in order to determine the bonding in atoms and for mapping chemical reactions, and instead showed that reliable conclusions can be reached without this data provided that the average number of electrons at a specific location is known. With the new generation of more powerful computers, his density-functional theory has been invaluable in research into the electronic structure of materials, and allowed the complicated mathematics of quantum mechanics to be applied the study of chemical bonding between atoms. Kohn won the Nobel Prize for Chemistry (shared with <a href="/people/833/000100533/">John A. Pople</a>) in 1998.Father: Salomon Kohn (print shop owner, d. Auschwitz) Mother: Gittel Kohn (d. Auschwitz) Son: Minna Kohn Wife: Lois Kohn Wife: Mara Vishniac Schiff (m. 19-Jun-1955, until his death, one daughter, two sons) Daughter: Sharon Ruth Son: Martin Steven Son: Thomas David     High School: Akademisches Gymnasium, Vienna, Austria (attended, 1933-38)     High School: Zwi Perez Chajes Gymnasium, Vienna, Austria (attended, 1938)     High School: East Grinstead County School, Sussex, England (1939)     University: <a href="/edu/751/000068547/">BA Mathematics and Physics, University of Toronto (1945)</a>     University: <a href="/edu/751/000068547/">MA Applied Mathematics, University of Toronto (1946)</a>     University: <a href="/edu/473/000068269/">PhD Physics, Harvard University (1948)</a>     Lecturer: <a href="/edu/473/000068269/">Physics, Harvard University (1948-50)</a>     Teacher: <a href="/edu/530/000068326/">Physics, Carnegie Mellon University (1950-51)</a>     Teacher: <a href="/edu/735/000071522/">Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen (1951-52)</a>     Teacher: <a href="/edu/530/000068326/">Physics, Carnegie Mellon University (1952-58)</a>     Professor: <a href="/edu/530/000068326/">Physics, Carnegie Mellon University (1958-60)</a>     Professor: <a href="/edu/562/000068358/">Physics, University of California at San Diego (1960-79)</a>     Professor: <a href="/edu/774/000068570/">Physics, University of California at Santa Barbara (1979-91)</a>     Administrator: <a href="/edu/774/000068570/">Institute for Theoretical Physics, University of California at Santa Barbara (1979-84)</a>     Professor: <a href="/edu/774/000068570/">Emeritus, University of California at Santa Barbara (1991-)</a>     APS Oliver E. Buckley Condensed Matter Prize 1960     <a href="/honors/485/000032389/">Guggenheim Fellowship</a> 1963     APS Davisson-Germer Prize in Atomic or Surface Physics 1977     <a href="/honors/636/000042510/">National Medal of Science</a> 1988     QMBT Eugene Feenberg Medal 1991     Niels Bohr Gold Medal 1998     <a href="/honors/213/000068009/">Nobel Prize for Chemistry</a> 1998 (with <a href="/people/833/000100533/">John A. Pople</a>)     <a href="/company/700/000042574/">IBM</a> Consultant (1978)     General Atomic Consultant (1960-72)     <a href="/company/927/000099630/">Bell Laboratories</a> Consultant (1953-66)     <a href="/company/240/000125862/">Westinghouse</a> Consultant (1953-57)     Koulomzine Geophysicist (1944-46)     Sutton & Horsley Pty Ltd Physicist (1941-43)     <a href="/org/811/000055646/">American Academy of Arts and Sciences</a> 1963     <a href="/org/640/000052484/">American Philosophical Society</a> 1994     Bavarian Academy of Sciences Foreign Member, 2003     Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation     <a href="/org/218/000165720/">International Academy of Quantum Molecular Science</a> 1991     <a href="/org/692/000054530/">National Academy of Sciences</a> 1969     <a href="/org/821/000055656/">National Research Council</a> Fellowship, 1950-51     <a href="/org/592/000071379/">National Science Foundation</a> Fellowship, 1958     <a href="/org/592/000071379/">National Science Foundation</a> Fellowship, 1967     <a href="/org/793/000055628/">Royal Society</a> Foreign Member, 1998     <a href="/org/674/000171161/">Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee</a>     <a href="/lists/385/000047244/">Austrian Ancestry</a>     <a href="/lists/481/000045346/">Jewish Ancestry</a>     <a href="/event/801/000085546/">Naturalized Canadian Citizen</a> 1943     <a href="/event/582/000051429/">Naturalized US Citizen</a> 1957     Risk Factors: <a href="/lists/483/000162994/">Meningitis</a> <table> <tr> <td align=right valign=middle style="padding-right: 5px;">New! <a href="http://mapper.nndb.com/" class="fotmlink" style="font-family: Tahoma, sans-serif; font-size: 10px; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; color: #dd0000;">NNDB MAPPER</a></td> <td valign=middle align=right style="border-left: 1px solid #bbb; padding-left: 5px;">Create a map starting with</td> <td valign=middle align=right><a href="http://mapper.nndb.com/start/?id=100536"><img src="/man.gif" border=0 style="padding: 2px;"></a></td> <td align=left valign=middle> <a href="http://mapper.nndb.com/start/?id=100536">Walter Kohn</a></td> </tr> </table> Requires Flash 7+ and Javascript. 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Walter Kohn