Jim Watson, FRS, (20 April 1936—18 December 2020) who published under the name J.K.G. Watson, was a molecular spectroscopist most well known for the development of the widely used

molecular Hamiltonian In atomic, molecular, and optical physics and quantum chemistry, the molecular Hamiltonian is the Hamiltonian operator representing the energy of the electrons and nuclei in a molecule. This operator and the associated Schrödinger equation pl ...

s named after him (sometimes called "Watsonians" or "Watson Hamiltonians"). These Hamiltonians are used to describe the quantum dynamics of molecules.

Education and career

Watson did his Ph.D. at the

University of Glasgow , image = UofG Coat of Arms.png , image_size = 150px , caption = Coat of arms Flag , latin_name = Universitas Glasguensis , motto = la, Via, Veritas, Vita , ...

, and worked in the UK, United States and

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. He was a

postdoctoral fellow A postdoctoral fellow, postdoctoral researcher, or simply postdoc, is a person professionally conducting research after the completion of their doctoral studies (typically a PhD). The ultimate goal of a postdoctoral research position is to p ...

under Jon Hougen in the Molecular Spectroscopy Group of Gerhard Herzberg at the National Research Council of

in Ottawa, Ontario from 1963 to 1965. He eventually joined the staff in the group in 1982 where he remained until retirement. Watson published a number of papers in which he developed and applied molecular Hamiltonians to problems in spectroscopy. In 1968 Watson published ''Simplification of the molecular vibration-rotation Hamiltonian'', in which he presented a practical framework for the quantum-mechanical description of molecular ro-vibrational dynamics within the Born-Oppenheimer approximation.

Honors and awards

He was a

Fellow of the Royal Society Fellowship of the Royal Society (FRS, ForMemRS and HonFRS) is an award granted by the judges of the Royal Society of London to individuals who have made a "substantial contribution to the improvement of natural science, natural knowledge, incl ...

, the

Royal Society of Canada The Royal Society of Canada (RSC; french: Société royale du Canada, SRC), also known as the Academies of Arts, Humanities and Sciences of Canada (French: ''Académies des arts, des lettres et des sciences du Canada''), is the senior national, bil ...

and the

American Physical Society The American Physical Society (APS) is a not-for-profit membership organization of professionals in physics and related disciplines, comprising nearly fifty divisions, sections, and other units. Its mission is the advancement and diffusion of k ...

. He received the 1986 Earle K. Plyer Prize for Molecular Spectroscopy and Dynamics from the American Physical Society. The citation reads: "For his numerous fundamental contributions to the theory of rovibronic interactions in molecules, especially the development of the universally used Watson Hamiltonian for vibration-rotation energy levels, the unified treatment of centrifugal distortion in molecules, the elucidation of forbidden rotational transitions in spherical tops, the application of advanced symmetry arguments to perturbations in external fields, and investigations of the Jahn-Teller effect in H_3 and NH_4."

Personal life

Watson was married to Carolyn Kerr. He died in his home in

New Edinburgh New Edinburgh is a neighbourhood in Rideau-Rockcliffe Ward, in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It is located to the northeast of the downtown core. It is bordered on the west by the Rideau River, to the north by the Ottawa River, to the south by Bee ...

after a brief illness on 17 December 2020 at the age of 84.

References

1930s births 2020 deaths Fellows of the Royal Society Fellows of the Royal Society of Canada Fellows of the American Physical Society Spectroscopists Academics of the University of Glasgow {{chemist-stub