Walter Kohn: the theoretical physicist who created DFT and won the Nobel Prize for Chemistry

Add to your list(s) Download to your calendar using vCal

• Prof. Sir David Clary, FRS (University of Oxford)
• Thursday 22 May 2025, 14:00-15:30
• TCM Seminar Room.

If you have a question about this talk, please contact Bo Peng.

Density Functional Theory (DFT) has become one of the most highly cited techniques in science, widely used for simulations in physics, chemistry, materials science and biology. The modern form of DFT was invented by Walter Kohn after a remarkable personal journey which included escaping on the Kindertransport to England on almost the last train out of Vienna in August 1939, and then being interned in Canada deep in a forest miles from civilisation. Despite these disadvantages, Walter Kohn was able to have an exceptional academic career in theoretical solid state physics which culminated in DFT and the Nobel Prize (but for Chemistry, not Physics). Drawing on fresh insights from his recent biography Walter Kohn: From Kindertransport and Internment to DFT and the Nobel Prize , David Clary will describe the remarkable life, career and science of Walter Kohn.

This talk is part of the Theory of Condensed Matter series.

This talk is included in these lists:

• All Cavendish Laboratory Seminars
• All Talks (aka the CURE list)
• Centre for Health Leadership and Enterprise
• Combined TCM Seminars and TCM blackboard seminar listing
• Featured lists
• Lennard-Jones Centre external
• ME Seminar
• Neurons, Fake News, DNA and your iPhone: The Mathematics of Information
• PMRFPS's
• School of Physical Sciences
• TCM Seminar Room
• Theory of Condensed Matter
• Thin Film Magnetic Talks
• few29

Note that ex-directory lists are not shown.