Biographical Memoirs Volume 86 (2005) / Chapter Skim
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Harry George Drickamer
Harry George Drickamer
Pages 78-95
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From page 79... ...
From an experimentalist's point of view it is most remarkable that Harry Drickamer was able to develop and perfect high-pressure instrumentation for so many spectroscopic and nonspectroscopic techniques, to name a few: infrared spectroscopy, Mossbauer spectroscopy, fluorescence spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction, conductivity measurements, and scintillation experiments. Furthermore, he was the first to develop instrumentation for high-pressure experiments to many hundreds of kilobars.
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From page 80... ...
Harry George Drickamer was born Harold George Weidenthal on November 19, 1918, to Louise Weidenthal and Harold Weidenthal in Cleveland, Ohio. His father died when Harry was very young, and after his mother remarried, Harry's stepfather, George Drickamer, adopted him.
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From page 81... ...
The next several years were pivotal in Harry Drickamer's professional career. In 1942 he took a position at the Pan American Refinery in Texas City, Texas.
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From page 82... ...
After solving many problems in physics and quantum mechanics, Harry Drickamer developed a taste for science and realized that he would like to become a scientist. In addition to the 48-hour workweek, Harry Drickamer used a vapor liquid at night and on Sundays to collect experimental data that the University of Michigan permitted him to use as a part of his Ph.D.
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From page 83... ...
Many of his students became successful and prominent scientists. Election to the National Academy of Engineering, the National Academy of Sciences, and the American Philosophical Society represents some of the major honors received by his former students.
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From page 84... ...
He was very proud and involved with his five children, who are successful professionals: Lee, professor and head of biology at Northern Arizona University at Flagstaff; Lynn, technical library assistant in the Law Library at the University of Michigan; Kurt, professor of biochemistry at Oxford University in England; Margaret, professor of medicine at Yale Medical School; and Priscilla Atkins, a reference librarian at Hope College, Michigan, who is also a poet with more than 50 published poems. His three grandchildren were a source of great pleasure and joy to him.
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From page 85... ...
Together with a radiochemist colleague, Robert Duffield, he designed an apparatus to measure radioactivity at high pressure and then studied the diffusion of molecules in liquids and gases. In the period from 1955 to 1958, after he developed the unique instrumentation to investigate electronic spectra by optical absorption under high pressure, his initial studies dealt with transition metal ions and ligand field theory, absorption edges of Si, Ge, and a variety of II-V and II-VI compounds.
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From page 86... ...
In the period from approximately 195S to 1963 he and his students carried out measurements of the optical absorption edge and electrical resistance of a variety of materials; they observed that with increasing pressure many of these materials became metals or narrow gap semiconductors. These insulator-to-metal transitions were observed in 12, Si, Ge, Se, and in various compounds, using a combination of optical absorption and electrical resistance measurements.
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From page 87... ...
High-pressure luminescence experiments were also used to characterize molecular interactions in polymeric materials, including tests of theories of energy transfer between molecules, the effect of modifying ligands in organometallic compounds, and the study of molecules that can exhibit more that one conformation in the excited state. Regarding the theoretical aspects of his work, it should be emphasized that Harry Drickamer's high-pressure experiments provided tests of many important theories, including Bethe's ligand field theory, Van Vleck's theory of the high-spin to low-spin transition, the Forster-Dexter's theory of energy transfer in phosphors, and Mulliken's theory of electron-acceptor complexes.
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From page 88... ...
As both these parameters change significantly with pressure, Harry's highpressure studies found that the theory is remarkably quantitative. An overview of Harry's research accomplishments would not be complete without a discussion of his pioneering contributions to high-pressure instrumentation.
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From page 89... ...
Amencan Physical Society, 1967 Oliver E Buckley Solid-State Physics Prize "for expenluer tal ir ver tiver ess, origir all ty ar d p hysi cal ir sigh t leadir g to significant results on the effects of extreme pressures on electronic and molecular structures of solids " Amencan Society for Ergineerirg Education, 1968 Victor Bendix Award "for his contribution in ergineenrg education and, in particular, his leadership ir educatir g er gir eels who er tered ir to the r ew field of the design of solids " Amencan Chemical Society, 1987 Peter Debye Award in Physical Chemistry "for the developmer t of high pressure as a widely applicable ir deperdent variable of central importance in the generation of physical chemistry that is crucial to the exploration of theories of phenomena in solids ar d liquids " 1987 Robert E Welch Prize in Chemistry "for his outstanding contributions to chemistry ar d all sciences concerned with the study of matter " I WOULD Lo to acknowledge Mae Elizabeth Drickamer for permitting me access to all the materials pertaining to the personal and research life of Harry George Drickamer.
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From page 90... ...
Department of Energy 1986 Alexander VOII Humboldt Award, Federal Republic of Germany Warren K Lewis Award, American institute of Chemical Engineers 1987 Peter Debye Award in Physical Chemistry, American Chemical Society Robert A
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From page 91... ...
HARRY GEORGE DRICKAMER 9 1994 Doctor of chemical science honoris cause, Russian Academy of Science 1996 Gold Medal, American institute of Chemists
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From page 92... ...
High pressure studies of doped alkali halides 111: Rates of electron transfer processes.
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From page 93... ...
57:17341738. 1986 Pressure tuning spectroscopy.
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From page 94... ...
High pressure luminescence studies on the twisted intramolecular charge transfer molecule, 4-(N, N dimethylamino) benzonitrile in polymer matrices.J Phys.
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