Charlotte Elster is a German-American theoretical

nuclear physicist Nuclear physics is the field of physics that studies atomic nuclei and their constituents and interactions, in addition to the study of other forms of nuclear matter. Nuclear physics should not be confused with atomic physics, which studies the ...

whose early work made significant contributions to the formulation of the Bonn potential for the nuclear force, in joint work with

Ruprecht Machleidt Ruprecht Machleidt (December 18, 1943 – December 14, 2023) was a German-American theoretical nuclear physicist. Education and CV Ruprecht Machleidt was born on December 18, 1943 in Kiel, Germany and studied physics at the University of Bonn in B ...

and . In later research, she has developed methods for

supercomputer A supercomputer is a computer with a high level of performance as compared to a general-purpose computer. The performance of a supercomputer is commonly measured in floating-point operations per second ( FLOPS) instead of million instructions ...

s to model

few-body systems In mechanics, a few-body system consists of a small number of well-defined structures or point particles. Quantum mechanics In quantum mechanics, examples of few-body systems include light nuclear systems (that is, few-nucleon bound and scatterin ...

, including light nuclei. She is a professor of physics at

Ohio University Ohio University is a Public university, public research university in Athens, Ohio. The first university chartered by an Act of Congress and the first to be chartered in Ohio, the university was chartered in 1787 by the Congress of the Confeder ...

Education and career

Elster studied theoretical physics at the

University of Bonn The Rhenish Friedrich Wilhelm University of Bonn (german: Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn) is a public research university located in Bonn, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It was founded in its present form as the ( en, Rhine U ...

, earning a diploma there in 1983 and completing her Ph.D. in 1986. After postdoctoral research at

Kent State University Kent State University (KSU) is a public research university in Kent, Ohio. The university also includes seven regional campuses in Northeast Ohio and additional facilities in the region and internationally. Regional campuses are located in As ...

, the

University of Maryland The University of Maryland, College Park (University of Maryland, UMD, or simply Maryland) is a public land-grant research university in College Park, Maryland. Founded in 1856, UMD is the flagship institution of the University System of M ...

, and

Ohio State University The Ohio State University, commonly called Ohio State or OSU, is a public land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio. A member of the University System of Ohio, it has been ranked by major institutional rankings among the best publ ...

, she became an assistant professor of physics at

in 1991. She was promoted to associate professor in 1996 and full professor in 2002, and served as director of the Institute of Nuclear and Particle Physics from 2003 to 2009.

Recognition

Elster was named a

Fellow of the American Physical Society The American Physical Society honors members with the designation ''Fellow'' for having made significant accomplishments to the field of physics. The following lists are divided chronologically by the year of designation. * List of American Physic ...

(APS) in 2001, after a nomination from the APS Topical Group on Few-Body Systems and Multiparticle Dynamics, "for her significant contributions to the understanding of the nucleon-nucleon interaction and its applications in few-body systems and nuclear reactions".

Personal life

As well as being a physicist, Elster is a devoted amateur

figure skater Figure skating is a sport in which individuals, pairs, or groups perform on figure skates on ice. It was the first winter sport to be included in the Olympic Games, when contested at the 1908 Olympics in London. The Olympic disciplines are me ...

References

External links

Home page
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Elster, Charlotte Year of birth missing (living people) Living people German nuclear physicists German women physicists American nuclear physicists American women physicists Women nuclear physicists University of Bonn alumni Ohio University faculty Fellows of the American Physical Society