Gregor Wentzel

Gregor Wentzel
Born(1898-02-17)17 February 1898
Died12 August 1978(1978-08-12) (aged 80)
NationalityGerman
Alma materUniversity of Greifswald
Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich
Known forQuantum field theory
Wentzel–Kramers–Brillouin approximation
AwardsMax Planck Medal (1975)
Scientific career
FieldsPhysics
InstitutionsLudwig Maximilian University of Munich
University of Leipzig
University of Zurich
University of Chicago
Doctoral advisorArnold Sommerfeld
Doctoral studentsValentine Bargmann
Markus Fierz
Res Jost
Nicholas Kemmer
Felix Villars

Gregor Wentzel (17 February 1898 – 12 August 1978) was a German physicist known for development of quantum mechanics. Wentzel, Hendrik Kramers, and Léon Brillouin developed the Wentzel–Kramers–Brillouin approximation in 1926. In his early years, he contributed to X-ray spectroscopy, but then broadened out to make contributions to quantum mechanics, quantum electrodynamics, superconductivity and meson theory.[1][2][3][4]

  1. ^ Mehra. Volume 1, Part 1, 2001, p. 356.
  2. ^ Gregor Wentzel Archived 2009-11-09 at the Wayback Machine – ETH Bibliothek.
  3. ^ Jungnickel. Volume 2, 1990, p. 368.
  4. ^ Telegdi, V. L. (November 1978). "Obituary: Gregor Wentzel". Physics Today. 31 (11): 85–86. Bibcode:1978PhT....31k..85T. doi:10.1063/1.2994844. Archived from the original on 2013-09-27.