Peter Debye | |
---|---|
Born |
Maastricht, Netherlands |
March 24, 1884
Died | November 2, 1966 Ithaca, New York, USA |
(aged 82)
Citizenship | Netherlands / United States |
Fields | Physics, Chemistry |
Institutions |
University of Zurich (1911–12) ETH Zurich (1920–27) University of Leipzig (1927–34) University of Berlin (1934–39) Cornell University (1940–50) |
Alma mater |
RWTH Aachen University of Munich |
Doctoral advisor | Arnold Sommerfeld |
Doctoral students |
Lars Onsager Paul Scherrer Raymund Sänger Franz Wever George K. Fraenkel Fritz Zwicky |
Known for |
Debye model Debye relaxation Debye temperature |
Notable awards | Rumford Medal (1930) Lorentz Medal (1935) Nobel Prize in Chemistry (1936) Willard Gibbs Award (1949) Max Planck Medal (1950) Priestley Medal (1963) National Medal of Science (1965) |
University of Zurich (1911–12)
University of Utrecht (1912–14)
Peter Joseph William Debye ForMemRS (/dɛˈbaɪ/;Dutch: [dəˈbɛiə]; March 24, 1884 – November 2, 1966) was a Dutch-American physicist and physical chemist, and Nobel laureate in Chemistry.
Born Petrus Josephus Wilhelmus Debije in Maastricht, Netherlands, Debye enrolled in the Aachen University of Technology in 1901. In 1905, he completed his first degree in electrical engineering. He published his first paper, a mathematically elegant solution of a problem involving eddy currents, in 1907. At Aachen, he studied under the theoretical physicist Arnold Sommerfeld, who later claimed that his most important discovery was Peter Debye.
In 1906, Sommerfeld received an appointment at Munich, Bavaria, and took Debye with him as his assistant. Debye got his Ph.D. with a dissertation on radiation pressure in 1908. In 1910, he derived the Planck radiation formula using a method which Max Planck agreed was simpler than his own.