Bertrand I. Halperin (born December 6, 1941) is an American physicist, former holder of the Hollis Chair of Mathematicks and Natural Philosophy at the

physics Physics is the natural science that studies matter, its fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge which r ...

department of

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...

Biography

Halperin was born in

Brooklyn, New York Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

, where he grew up in the Crown Heights neighborhood and attended public schools. His mother was Eva Teplitzky Halperin and his father Morris Halperin. His mother was a college administrator and his father a customs inspector. Both his parents were born in

USSR The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...

. His paternal grandmother's family the Maximovs claimed descent from

Rabbi Israel Baal Shem Tov Israel ben Eliezer (1698 – 22 May 1760), known as the Baal Shem Tov ( he, בעל שם טוב, ) or as the Besht, was a Jewish mystic and healer who is regarded as the founder of Hasidic Judaism. "Besht" is the acronym for Baal Shem Tov, which ...

, the BESHT. He attended

(class of 1961), and did his graduate work at Berkeley with John J. Hopfield (PhD 1965). After 10 years (1966–1976) working at

Bell Laboratories Nokia Bell Labs, originally named Bell Telephone Laboratories (1925–1984), then AT&T Bell Laboratories (1984–1996) and Bell Labs Innovations (1996–2007), is an American industrial research and scientific development company owned by mult ...

, Murray Hill, New Jersey he was appointed Professor of Physics at

. In the 1970s, he, together with

David R. Nelson David R. Nelson (born May 9, 1951) is an American physicist, and Arthur K. Solomon Professor of Biophysics, at Harvard University. Education and research David R. Nelson is currently thArthur K. Solomon Professor of Biophysics and Professor o ...

, worked out a theory of two-dimensional

melting Melting, or fusion, is a physical process that results in the phase transition of a substance from a solid to a liquid. This occurs when the internal energy of the solid increases, typically by the application of heat or pressure, which inc ...

, predicting the hexatic phase before it was experimentally observed by Pindak ''et al.'' In the 1980s, he made contributions to the theory of the

Quantum Hall Effect The quantum Hall effect (or integer quantum Hall effect) is a quantized version of the Hall effect which is observed in two-dimensional electron systems subjected to low temperatures and strong magnetic fields, in which the Hall resistance exh ...

and of the Fractional Quantum Hall Effect. His recent interests lie in the area of strongly interacting low-dimensional electron systems. Halperin was elected a Fellow of the American Physical Society in 1972, a member of 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, a ...

in 1981, a member of the National Academy of Sciences in 1982, and a member of the

American Philosophical Society The American Philosophical Society (APS), founded in 1743 in Philadelphia, is a scholarly organization that promotes knowledge in the sciences and humanities through research, professional meetings, publications, library resources, and communit ...

in 1990. In 2001, he was awarded the

Lars Onsager Prize The Lars Onsager Prize is a prize in theoretical statistical physics awarded annually by the American Physical Society. Prize recipients receive a medal, certificate, and $10,000. It was established in 1993 by Drs. Russell and Marian Donnelly in m ...

. In 2003, he and Anthony J. Leggett were awarded 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 nati ...

in physics. In 2016 he was Lise Meitner Distinguished Lecturer. In 2018, he was awarded the 2019 APS Medal for Exceptional Achievement in Research, for "his seminal contributions to theoretical condensed matter physics, especially his pioneering work on the role of topology in both classical and quantum systems.""2019 APS Medal for Exceptional Achievement in Research Recipient: Bertrand I. Halperin"
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Selected bibliography

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Pdf.

References

External links

Harvard University faculty pageWolf Prize page
* 1941 births Harvard University alumni American people of Ukrainian-Jewish descent 21st-century American physicists Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Fellows of the American Physical Society Harvard University faculty Jewish American scientists Jewish physicists Living people Scientists at Bell Labs University of California, Berkeley alumni Wolf Prize in Physics laureates Hollis Chair of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy Oliver E. Buckley Condensed Matter Prize winners Descendants of the Baal Shem Tov {{US-physicist-stub Members of the American Philosophical Society

Biography

Selected bibliography

See also

References

External links