Alexander Pines (born June 22, 1945) is an American chemist. He is the

Glenn T. Seaborg Glenn Theodore Seaborg (; April 19, 1912February 25, 1999) was an American chemist whose involvement in the synthesis, discovery and investigation of ten transuranium elements earned him a share of the 1951 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. His work i ...

Professor Emeritus,

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...

, Chancellor's Professor Emeritus and Professor of the Graduate School, University of California, Berkeley, and a member of the

California Institute for Quantitative Biosciences The California Institute for Quantitative Biosciences (QB3) is a nonprofit research and technology commercialization institute affiliated with three University of California campuses in the San Francisco Bay Area: Berkeley, San Francisco, and ...

(QB3) and the Department of Bioengineering. He was born in 1945, grew up in Bulawayo in

Southern Rhodesia Southern Rhodesia was a landlocked self-governing British Crown colony in southern Africa, established in 1923 and consisting of British South Africa Company (BSAC) territories lying south of the Zambezi River. The region was informally kn ...

(now

Zimbabwe Zimbabwe (), officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country located in Southeast Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers, bordered by South Africa to the south, Botswana to the south-west, Zambia to the north, and Mozam ...

) and studied undergraduate mathematics and chemistry in Israel at

Hebrew University of Jerusalem The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJI; he, הַאוּנִיבֶרְסִיטָה הַעִבְרִית בִּירוּשָׁלַיִם) is a public research university based in Jerusalem, Israel. Co-founded by Albert Einstein and Dr. Chaim Weiz ...

. Coming to the United States in 1968, Pines obtained his Ph.D. in chemical physics at

M.I.T. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the m ...

in 1972 and joined the UC Berkeley faculty later that year.

Research

Pines is a pioneer in the development and applications of

nuclear magnetic resonance Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) is a physical phenomenon in which nuclei in a strong constant magnetic field are perturbed by a weak oscillating magnetic field (in the near field) and respond by producing an electromagnetic signal with a ...

(NMR) spectroscopy of non-liquid samples. In his early work, he demonstrated time-reversal of dipole-dipole couplings in many-body spin systems, and introduced high sensitivity, cross polarization NMR of dilute spins such as

carbon-13 Carbon-13 (13C) is a natural, stable isotope of carbon with a nucleus containing six protons and seven neutrons. As one of the environmental isotopes, it makes up about 1.1% of all natural carbon on Earth. Detection by mass spectrometry A mass ...

in solids (

Proton Enhanced Nuclear Induction Spectroscopy Cross-polarization (CP), also known as proton-enhanced nuclear induction spectroscopy is a solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (ssNMR) technique to transfer nuclear magnetization from different types of nuclei via heteronuclear dipolar interac ...

), thereby helping to launch the era of modern

solid-state NMR Solid-state NMR (ssNMR) spectroscopy is a technique for characterizing atomic level structure in solid materials e.g. powders, single crystals and amorphous samples and tissues using nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy. The anisotropic pa ...

in chemistry. He also developed the areas of multiple-quantum

spectroscopy Spectroscopy is the field of study that measures and interprets the electromagnetic spectra that result from the interaction between electromagnetic radiation and matter as a function of the wavelength or frequency of the radiation. Matter wa ...

, adiabatic sech/tanh inversion pulses, zero-field NMR, double rotation and dynamic-angle spinning, iterative maps for pulse sequences and quantum control, and the quantum geometric phase. His combination of optical pumping and cross-polarization made it possible to observe enhanced NMR of surfaces and the selective "lighting up" of solution NMR and

magnetic resonance imaging Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is a medical imaging technique used in radiology to form pictures of the anatomy and the physiological processes of the body. MRI scanners use strong magnetic fields, magnetic field gradients, and radio wave ...

(MRI) by means of laser-polarized

xenon Xenon is a chemical element with the symbol Xe and atomic number 54. It is a dense, colorless, odorless noble gas found in Earth's atmosphere in trace amounts. Although generally unreactive, it can undergo a few chemical reactions such as the ...

. Until he retired to emeritus status, his program was composed of two complementary components. The first is the establishment of new concepts and techniques in NMR and MRI, in order to extend their applicability and enhance their capability to investigate molecular structure, organization and function from materials to organisms. Examples of methodologies emanating from these efforts include: novel polarization and detection methods, ex-situ and mobile NMR and MRI, laser-polarized NMR and MRI, functionalized NMR biosensors and molecular imaging, ultralow and zero-field

SQUID True squid are molluscs with an elongated soft body, large eyes, eight arms, and two tentacles in the superorder Decapodiformes, though many other molluscs within the broader Neocoleoidea are also called squid despite not strictly fitting t ...

NMR and MRI, remote detection of NMR and MRI amplified by means of

laser A laser is a device that emits light through a process of optical amplification based on the stimulated emission of electromagnetic radiation. The word "laser" is an acronym for "light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation". The fir ...

magnetometers A magnetometer is a device that measures magnetic field or magnetic dipole moment. Different types of magnetometers measure the direction, strength, or relative change of a magnetic field at a particular location. A compass is one such device, ...

, and miniaturization including fluid flow through porous materials and "microfluidic chemistry and NMR/MRI on a chip". The second component of his research program involves the application of such novel methods to problems in chemistry, materials science, and biomedicine.

Awards

Among his many prestigious awards and honors, Pines has received the Langmuir Medal of the American Chemical Society, the

Faraday Medal The Faraday Medal is a top international medal awarded by the UK Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) (previously called the Institution of Electrical Engineers (IEE)). It is part of the IET Achievement Medals collection of awards. T ...

of the Royal Society of Chemistry, the

Wolf Prize The Wolf Prize is an international award granted in Israel, that has been presented most years since 1978 to living scientists and artists for ''"achievements in the interest of mankind and friendly relations among people ... irrespective of natio ...

for Chemistry (together with

Richard R. Ernst Richard Robert Ernst (14 August 1933 – 4 June 2021) was a Swiss physical chemist and Nobel Laureate. Ernst was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1991 for his contributions towards the development of Fourier transform nuclear magnetic re ...

) in 1991. He was awarded the F.A. Cotton Medal for Excellence in Chemical Research of the

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 ...

in 1999. In 2005, an Ampere Symposium was held in honor of Pines' 60th birthday in

Chamonix Chamonix-Mont-Blanc ( frp, Chamôni), more commonly known as Chamonix, is a commune in the Haute-Savoie department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region of southeastern France. It was the site of the first Winter Olympics in 1924. In 2019, it had ...

, France, and in 2008, he was awarded the

Russell Varian Prize The Russell Varian Prize was an international scientific prize awarded for a single, high-impact and innovative contribution in the field of nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), that laid the foundation for the development of new technologies in the fi ...

at the European Magnetic Resonance Conference. (Previous Varian Prizes winners:

Jean Jeener Jean Louis Charles Jeener is a Belgian physical chemist and physicist, well known for his experimental and theoretical contributions to spin thermodynamics in solids and for his invention of Two-dimensional nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. ...

Erwin Hahn Erwin Louis Hahn (June 9, 1921 – September 20, 2016) was an American physicist, best known for his work on nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR).Filler, AG: The history, development, and impact of computed imaging in neurological diagnosis and neuros ...

Nicolaas Bloembergen Nicolaas Bloembergen (March 11, 1920 – September 5, 2017) was a Dutch-American physicist and Nobel laureate, recognized for his work in developing driving principles behind nonlinear optics for laser spectroscopy. During his career, he was a p ...

, John. S. Waugh, and Alfred G. Redfield.) Pines has also been recognized by numerous teaching honors, including the University of California's Distinguished Teaching Award. He is a member of the U.S.

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the Nati ...

, the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and ...

and a Foreign Member of the

Royal Society The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...

(London); he is Doctor Honoris Causa at the

Weizmann Institute of Science The Weizmann Institute of Science ( he, מכון ויצמן למדע ''Machon Vaitzman LeMada'') is a public research university in Rehovot, Israel, established in 1934, 14 years before the State of Israel. It differs from other Israeli unive ...

, Universite Paul Cezanne,

University of Paris , image_name = Coat of arms of the University of Paris.svg , image_size = 150px , caption = Coat of Arms , latin_name = Universitas magistrorum et scholarium Parisiensis , motto = ''Hic et ubique terrarum'' (Latin) , mottoeng = Here and a ...

and the University of Rome, and past President of the International Society of Magnetic Resonance.

References

External links

BiographyU.C. Berkeley College of Chemistry faculty pagePines Group WebpageAlex Pines webpage
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pines, Alexander 1945 births Living people People from Tel Aviv 21st-century American chemists Faraday Lecturers Foreign Members of the Royal Society Hebrew University of Jerusalem alumni Israeli chemists Israeli emigrants to the United States Israeli Jews Jewish American scientists Jewish chemists MIT Department of Physics alumni Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Rhodesian Jews UC Berkeley College of Chemistry faculty White Rhodesian people Wolf Prize in Chemistry laureates Nuclear magnetic resonance Fellows of the American Physical Society 21st-century American Jews