Hugh David Politzer

Hugh David Politzer (/ˈpɑːlɪtsər/; born August 31,

1949) is an American theoretical physicist and the Hugh David Politzer
Richard Chace Tolman Professor of Theoretical Born August 31, 1949
Physics at the California Institute of Technology.[1][2] New York City, U.S.
He shared the 2004 Nobel Prize in Physics with David Alma mater University of Michigan
Gross and Frank Wilczek for their discovery of Harvard University
asymptotic freedom in quantum chromodynamics.[3] Known for Asymptotic freedom
Prediction of charmonium
Quantum chromodynamics
Life and career Awards Nobel Prize in Physics (2004)
Sakurai Prize (1986)
Politzer was born in New York City. His father was
Alan (Hungarian: Aladár) born in Nádszeg, Kingdom Scientific career
of Hungary. His mother was Valerie Politzer[4] and Fields Physics
they escaped to England from Czechoslovakia in 1939 Institutions California Institute of Technology
and immigrated to the U.S. after World War II. He
Thesis Asymptotic freedom: an
graduated from the Bronx High School of Science in
approach to strong interactions
1966, received his bachelor's degree in physics from
(https://www.proquest.com/docvi
the University of Michigan in 1969, and his PhD in
ew/302695108/) (1974)
1974 from Harvard University, where his graduate
Doctoral Sidney Coleman
advisor was Sidney Coleman.
advisor
In his first published article, which appeared in 1973, Doctoral Stephen Wolfram
Politzer described the phenomenon of asymptotic students
freedom: the closer quarks are to each other, the
weaker the strong interaction will be between them.[5] When quarks are in extreme proximity, the nuclear
force between them is so weak that they behave almost like free particles. This result—independently
discovered at around the same time by Gross and Wilczek at Princeton University—was extremely
important in the development of quantum chromodynamics. With Thomas Appelquist, Politzer also
played a central role in predicting the existence of "charmonium", a subatomic particle formed of a charm
quark and a charm antiquark.

Politzer was a junior fellow at the Harvard Society of Fellows from 1974 to 1977 before moving to the
California Institute of Technology (Caltech), where he is currently professor of theoretical physics. In
1986, he was awarded the J. J. Sakurai Prize for Theoretical Particle Physics by the American Physical
Society.[6] In 1989, he appeared in a minor role in the movie Fat Man and Little Boy, as Manhattan
Project physicist Robert Serber.[7] The Nobel Prize in Physics 2004 was awarded jointly to David J.
Gross, H. David Politzer and Frank Wilczek "for the discovery of asymptotic freedom in the theory of the
strong interaction."
Politzer is one of the 20 American recipients of the Nobel Prize in Physics to sign a letter addressed to
President George W. Bush in May 2008, urging him to "reverse the damage done to basic science
research in the Fiscal Year 2008 Omnibus Appropriations Bill" by requesting additional emergency
funding for the Department of Energy’s Office of Science, the National Science Foundation, and the
National Institute of Standards and Technology.[8]

Politzer was elected as a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2011.[9]

Politzer plays the banjo and has done research on the physics of the instrument.[10][11]

Trivia
Politzer was the lead vocalist in the 1980s for Professor Politzer and the Rho Mesons, which put out their
single, "The Simple Harmonic Oscillator".[12][13]

Politzer's Erdős-Bacon number is 5 – via appearing in Fat Man and Little Boy[14] with Laura Dern (in
Novocaine with Kevin Bacon) and publishing once with Sidney Coleman (Erdős number 2).

See also
List of Jewish Nobel laureates

References
Politzer, H.D. (1974). "Asymptotic Freedom: An Approach to Strong Interactions". Physics
Reports. 14 (4): 129–180. Bibcode:1974PhR....14..129D (https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/
1974PhR....14..129D). doi:10.1016/0370-1573(74)90014-3 (https://doi.org/10.1016%2F0370
-1573%2874%2990014-3).
1. "Hugh D. (David) Politzer | Caltech Directory" (https://directory.caltech.edu/personnel/politze
r). directory.caltech.edu. Retrieved May 11, 2020.
2. "Britannica" (https://www.britannica.com/biography/H-David-Politzer). April 26, 2024.
3. "The Nobel Prize in Physics 2004" (http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/200
4/). Nobel Web. 2004. Retrieved October 24, 2010.
4. "Tereza - Terka Diamant" (https://www.geni.com/people/Tereza-Terka-Diamant/6000000008
283880384). December 16, 2014.
5. H.D. Politzer (1973). "Reliable perturbative results for strong interactions?" (https://doi.org/1
0.1103%2FPhysRevLett.30.1346). Physical Review Letters. 30 (26): 1346–1349.
Bibcode:1973PhRvL..30.1346P (https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1973PhRvL..30.1346P).
doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.30.1346 (https://doi.org/10.1103%2FPhysRevLett.30.1346).
6. "American Institute of Physics" (https://history.aip.org/phn/11605029.html).
7. "David Politzer Wins Nobel Prize in Physics | Caltech" (http://www.caltech.edu/news/david-p
olitzer-wins-nobel-prize-physics-895). The California Institute of Technology. October 5,
2004. Retrieved December 3, 2017.
8. "A Letter from America's Physics Nobel Laureates" (https://fire.pppl.gov/nobel_bush_fy08_0
50808.pdf) (PDF).
 9. "Hugh David Politzer" (https://www.amacad.org/person/hugh-david-politzer). American
Academy of Arts & Sciences. Retrieved May 11, 2020.
10. Banjo Physics 411 AND Resonator Guitar Physics 412 https://www.its.caltech.edu/~politzer/
11. Burton, Howard (2021). Conversations About Physics, Volume 1. Toronto: Ideas Roadshow.
12. "The Simple Harmonic Oscillator" (http://theory.caltech.edu/~politzer/SHO.mp3).
caltech.edu.
13. "David Politzer" (http://theory.caltech.edu/~politzer/).
14. "Fat Man and Little Boy" (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0097336/fullcredits/?ref_=tt_ov_st_s
m). imdb.

External links
Hugh David Politzer (https://www.nobelprize.org/laureate/777) on Nobelprize.org including
the Nobel Lecture on December 8, 2004 The Dilemma of Attribution
List of papers, from SPIRES (https://archive.today/20121211155551/http://www.slac.stanfor
d.edu/spires/find/hep/www?rawcmd=ea+Politzer,+H+David)
Hugh David Politzer (https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0689261/) at IMDb
Caltech press release on Politzer winning the Nobel Prize (https://web.archive.org/web/2007
0304163745/http://pr.caltech.edu/media/Press_Releases/PR12590.html)
Hugh David Politzer (https://mathgenealogy.org/id.php?id=94782) at the Mathematics
Genealogy Project

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