Milton Kerker (September 25, 1920 — May 2, 2016) was an American physical chemist and former professor at Department of Chemistry at

Clarkson University Clarkson University is a private research university with its main campus in Potsdam, New York, and additional graduate program and research facilities in the New York Capital Region and Beacon, New York. It was founded in 1896 and has an enr ...

. He is best known for his work on

aerosol An aerosol is a suspension (chemistry), suspension of fine solid particles or liquid Drop (liquid), droplets in air or another gas. Aerosols can be natural or Human impact on the environment, anthropogenic. Examples of natural aerosols are fog o ...

, interface and colloid science, as well as for pioneering surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy. Kerker effect in optics is named after him.

Biography

Kerker was born on September 25, 1920, in

Utica, New York Utica () is a Administrative divisions of New York, city in the Mohawk Valley and the county seat of Oneida County, New York, United States. The List of cities in New York, tenth-most-populous city in New York State, its population was 65,283 ...

. He received his A.B. in chemistry from

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

in 1941. From 1942 to 1945, he was a member of

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cla ...

and received

Bronze Star Medal The Bronze Star Medal (BSM) is a United States Armed Forces decoration awarded to members of the United States Armed Forces for either heroic achievement, heroic service, meritorious achievement, or meritorious service in a combat zone. Wh ...

for his service. He married his wife, Reva Stemerman, in 1946. Graduating from Columbia University with a PhD in chemistry in 1949, he joined

as a professor in the same year. He acted as the chair of the Department of Chemistry from 1960 to 1964, as well as the Dean of Science from 1964 to 1966 and from 1981 to 1985. He retired from Clarkson University in 1991. Serving as the editor of '' Journal of Colloid and Interface Science'' from 1965 to 1992, he was also granted fellowships by Optical Society,

American Chemical Society The American Chemical Society (ACS) is a scientific society based in the United States that supports scientific inquiry in the field of chemistry. Founded in 1876 at New York University, the ACS currently has more than 155,000 members at all d ...

and Ford Foundation. Kerker died on May 2, 2016, in

Thousand Oaks, California Thousand Oaks is the second-largest city in Ventura County, California, United States. It is in the northwestern part of Greater Los Angeles, approximately from the city of Los Angeles and from Downtown Los Angeles, Downtown. It is named af ...

, U.S., and was survived by his wife and four children. He was a contributor to '' Midstream'' magazine and

Jewish Theological Seminary of America The Jewish Theological Seminary (JTS) is a Conservative Jewish education organization in New York City, New York. It is one of the academic and spiritual centers of Conservative Judaism and a major center for academic scholarship in Jewish studie ...

, as well as ''

Isis Isis (; ''Ēse''; ; Meroitic: ''Wos'' 'a''or ''Wusa''; Phoenician: 𐤀𐤎, romanized: ʾs) was a major goddess in ancient Egyptian religion whose worship spread throughout the Greco-Roman world. Isis was first mentioned in the Old Kingd ...

'' journal. Kerker's work encompassed

and

colloid A colloid is a mixture in which one substance consisting of microscopically dispersed insoluble particles is suspended throughout another substance. Some definitions specify that the particles must be dispersed in a liquid, while others extend ...

science, as well as their relation to light scattering by small particles. He is known for authoring the 1969 textbook on the subject, ''The Scattering of Light and Other Electromagnetic Radiation''. Regarded as a pioneer of surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS), he has worked on the mathematical models in the field. In 1986, Kerker also coauthored the article on light scattering by hypothetical

magnetic Magnetism is the class of physical attributes that are mediated by a magnetic field, which refers to the capacity to induce attractive and repulsive phenomena in other entities. Electric currents and the magnetic moments of elementary particle ...

spheres, which hypothesized a distinct absence of backscattering for small particles with equal relative permittivities and permeabilities. While being largely unnoticed at the time of its publication, the work has since attracted attention with the advent of metamaterials and

nanophotonics Nanophotonics or nano-optics is the study of the behavior of light on the nanometer scale, and of the interaction of nanometer-scale objects with light. It is a branch of optics, optical engineering, electrical engineering, and nanotechnology. It ...

; the associated phenomenon, named as Kerker effect, was later verified experimentally.

Selected publications

;Books * ;Journal articles * * * * * *

References

External links

''The Scattering of Light and Other Electromagnetic Radiation''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kerker, Milton 1920 births 2016 deaths People from Utica, New York 20th-century American chemists 20th-century American non-fiction writers 21st-century American non-fiction writers Columbia College (New York) alumni Clarkson University faculty American university and college faculty deans American physical chemists 20th-century American physicists Optical physicists Fellows of Optica (society) Jewish American physicists Jewish American writers Writers from Utica, New York Scientists from New York (state) United States Army personnel of World War II 20th-century American Jews 21st-century American Jews Fellows of the American Chemical Society Colloid chemists