Lu Jeu Sham ( Chinese: 沈呂九) (born April 28, 1938) is an American physicist. He is best known for his work with Walter Kohn on the Kohn–Sham equations.

Biography

Lu Jeu Sham's family was from

Fuzhou Fuzhou (; , Fuzhounese: Hokchew, ''Hók-ciŭ''), alternately romanized as Foochow, is the capital and one of the largest cities in Fujian province, China. Along with the many counties of Ningde, those of Fuzhou are considered to constitute ...

Fujian Fujian (; alternately romanized as Fukien or Hokkien) is a province on the southeastern coast of China. Fujian is bordered by Zhejiang to the north, Jiangxi to the west, Guangdong to the south, and the Taiwan Strait to the east. Its ...

, but he was born in

British Hong Kong Hong Kong was a colony and later a dependent territory of the British Empire from 1841 to 1997, apart from a period of occupation under the Japanese Empire from 1941 to 1945 during the Pacific War. The colonial period began with the British ...

on April 28, 1938. He was graduated from the Pui Ching Middle School in 1955 and then traveled to England for his higher education. He received his

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University o ...

in Mathematics (1st Class Honors) from Imperial College, University of London in 1960 and his

PhD PHD or PhD may refer to: * Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), an academic qualification Entertainment * '' PhD: Phantasy Degree'', a Korean comic series * '' Piled Higher and Deeper'', a web comic * Ph.D. (band), a 1980s British group ** Ph.D. (Ph.D. al ...

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 ...

from the

University of Cambridge , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...

in 1963. In 1963-66, he worked with Prof. W. Kohn as a postdoctoral fellow in University of California, San Diego. From 1966 to 1967, Sham worked in University of California, Irvine as Assistant Professor in Physics and from 1967 to 1968 in Queen Mary College, University of London as a Reader. He joined the faculty of University of California in 1968. Sham was a professor in the Department of Physics at

University of California, San Diego The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego or colloquially, UCSD) is a public land-grant research university in San Diego, California. Established in 1960 near the pre-existing Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UC San Diego is ...

, eventually serving as department head. He is now a UCSD

professor emeritus ''Emeritus'' (; female: ''emerita'') is an adjective used to designate a retired chair, professor, pastor, bishop, pope, director, president, prime minister, rabbi, emperor, or other person who has been "permitted to retain as an honorary title ...

. Sham was elected to the

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 Nat ...

in 1998.

Scientific contributions

Sham is noted for his work on

density functional theory Density-functional theory (DFT) is a computational quantum mechanical modelling method used in physics, chemistry and materials science to investigate the electronic structure (or nuclear structure) (principally the ground state) of many-body ...

(DFT) with Walter Kohn, which resulted in the Kohn–Sham equations of DFT. The Kohn–Sham method is widely used in materials science. Kohn received a

Nobel Prize in Chemistry ) , image = Nobel Prize.png , alt = A golden medallion with an embossed image of a bearded man facing left in profile. To the left of the man is the text "ALFR•" then "NOBEL", and on the right, the text (smaller) "NAT•" then "M ...

in 1998 for the Kohn–Sham equations and other work related to DFT. Sham's other research interests include

condensed matter physics Condensed matter physics is the field of physics that deals with the macroscopic and microscopic physical properties of matter, especially the solid and liquid phases which arise from electromagnetic forces between atoms. More generally, the su ...

and optical control of electron spins in

semiconductor A semiconductor is a material which has an electrical conductivity value falling between that of a conductor, such as copper, and an insulator, such as glass. Its resistivity falls as its temperature rises; metals behave in the opposite way ...

nanostructures for quantum information processing.

Honors and awards

*Member of the US National Academy of Sciences (1998) *Member of Academia Sinica (1998) *Fellow of American Association for the Advancement of Science (2011) *Fellow of American Physics Society (1977) *Fellow of Optica (formerly OSA) (2009) *The Willis E. Lamb Award for Laser Science and Quantum Optics (2004) *The MRS Materials Theory Award (2019) *Humboldt Foundation Award (1978) *Guggenheim Fellowship (1983)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sham, Lu Jeu 1938 births Living people University of California, San Diego faculty Hong Kong physicists Alumni of Imperial College London Alumni of the University of Cambridge Computational chemists Fellows of the American Physical Society