Ahmed H. Zewail

From Freepedia

Ahmed Hassan Zewail (Arabic: أحمد زويل) (born February 26, 1946) is an Egyptian chemist, and the winner of the 1999 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his work on femtochemistry. Born in Damanhur (60 km south-east of Alexandria) and raised in Disuq, he received his first degrees from the University of Alexandria before moving to the United States to complete his PhD at the University of Pennsylvania under the supervision of Robin.M.Hochstrasser. After some postdoctorate work at UC Berkeley, he was awarded a faculty appointment at Caltech in 1976, where he has remained since. In 1990 he was made the first "Linus Pauling Chair in Chemical Physics". He became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1982.

Zewail's key work has been as the pioneer of femtochemistry—i.e. the study of chemical reactions across femtoseconds. Using a rapid ultrafast laser technique (consisting of ultrashort laser flashes), the technique allows the description of reactions at the atomic level. It can be viewed as a highly sophisticated form of flash photography.

In 1999, Zewail became the third Egyptian to receive the Nobel Prize, following Anwar Sadat (1978 in Peace) and Naguib Mahfouz (1988 in Literature). Other international awards have included the Wolf Prize in Chemistry (1993) and the Robert A. Welch Award (1997). In 1999 he received Egypt's highest state honour, the Grand Collar of the Nile.

External links

• Website

Ahmed Zewail was born in Egypt in 1946. He received his bachelor’s and master’s degree at Alexandria University. He then got his doctorate degree at the University of Pennsylvania. He has received honorary degrees from many colleges in many countries including U.S.A., England, Switzerland, Egypt, Belgium, Australia, Canada, India, Italy, Scotland, Korea, Sweden and France. He has been awarded over 100 different honors including the Robert A. Welch Prize, Wolf Prize, King Faisal Prize, Benjamin Franklin Medal, Peter Debye Award, the E. O. Lawrence Award, and Order of the Grand Collar of the Nile. He has been elected a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Philosophical Society, the American Academy of Achievement, the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, the European Academy of Arts, Sciences, and Humanities, the Royal Society of London, and the Russian Academy of Sciences. He currently holds the position of Director of the NSF Laboratory for Molecular Sciences at the Californian Institute of Technology.