Francesco Iachello
{{Short description|Italian nuclear engineer and theoretical physicist}}
{{Infobox scientist
| name = Francesco Iachello
| image =
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| birth_date = {{birth date and age|1942|1|11|mf=y}}
| birth_place = Francofonte, Italy
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| nationality = Italian
| fields = Nuclear physics
| workplaces = Yale University
University of Groningen
Polytechnic University of Turin
| alma_mater = Polytechnic University of Turin
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
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| known_for = Interacting boson model
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| awards = {{Plainlist|
- Racah Lectures in Physics (1989)
- Wigner Medal (1990)
- Tom W. Bonner Prize (1993)
- Lise Meitner Prize (2002)
- Enrico Fermi Prize (2010)}}
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Francesco Iachello ({{IPA|it|franˈtʃesko jaˈkɛllo}}; born 11 January 1942) is an Italian nuclear engineer and theoretical physicist, who works mainly on nuclear and molecular physics. He and his collaborator Akito Arima are the creators of the "interacting boson model".
Biography
Iachello attained a doctorate 1964 as a nuclear technology engineer at the polytechnic institute in Turin and 1969 a doctorate in physics at the MIT Center for Theoretical Physics.{{cn|date=January 2024}} Since 1978 he has been at Yale University, where he is at present J. W. Gibbs professor for physics and chemistry.{{cn|date=January 2024}}
Iachello received the Chiaudano prize in 1968 and was a Fulbright Fellow in 1964. He was awarded in 1990 the Wigner Medal, in 1991 both the Taormina Prize and the Dutch AKZO Prize, and in 1993, along with Akito Arima, the Tom W. Bonner Prize of the American Physical Society. Iachello became a foreign member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1996.{{cite web|author= |url=https://www.knaw.nl/en/members/foreign-members/4297 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160130165215/https://www.knaw.nl/en/members/foreign-members/4297 |title=F. Iachello |publisher=Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences |date= |archive-date=30 January 2016 |access-date=30 January 2016}} He is also member of the Croatian Academy of Sciences. In 1997 he received the Centennial Prize of the Italian Physical Society. In 2002 he received the Meitner Prize of the European Physical Society. He has honorary doctorates from the University of Ferrara, the University of Seville, and Chung Yuan University in China.
Iachello is famous for the application of algebraic methods (Lie algebras) to the investigation of the spectra of atomic nuclei and molecules. In 1974 with Akito Arima he introduced the "Interacting Boson Model" into nuclear physics.{{cite journal | last1 = Arima | first1 = A. | title = Collective Nuclear States as Representations of a SU(6) Group | journal = Physical Review Letters | volume = 35 | issue = 16 | pages = 1069–1072 | year = 1975 | doi = 10.1103/PhysRevLett.35.1069 | bibcode=1975PhRvL..35.1069A}} This important model describes collective nuclear states with the help of the unitary group U(6). The underlying concept is to derive a model with pairs of neutrons and protons instead of unpaired nucleons. The pairs are treated as bosons with different quantum spin (s- and d- bosons, as named according to spin 0 and 2). In an extension of the model, the analogous effect with unpaired fermions has a description using supersymmetrical algebras.{{cite journal | last1 = Iachello | first1 = F. | s2cid = 14130911 | title = Dynamical Supersymmetries in Nuclei | journal = Physical Review Letters | volume = 44 | issue = 12 | pages = 772–775 | year = 1980 | doi = 10.1103/PhysRevLett.44.772 | bibcode=1980PhRvL..44..772I}}Iacchello "Supersymmetry in nuclei" American Scientist, May 1982
In recent times he has worked mainly on the investigation of the quantum mechanical dynamics of molecules (e.g. quantum phase transitions, polymer dynamics) with algebraic methods, on which Iachello already began to work in 1981 (Vibron Model).{{cite journal | last1 =Iachello | first1 =F | title =Algebraic methods for molecular rotation-vibration spectra | journal =Chemical Physics Letters | volume =78 | issue =3 | pages =581–585 | year =1981 | doi =10.1016/0009-2614(81)85262-1|bibcode = 1981CPL....78..581I }}{{cite journal|author1=Bijker, R|author2=Frank, A.|title=Regular spectra in the vibron model with random vibrations|journal=Phys. Rev. C|year=2002 |volume=65|issue=4|page=044316 |arxiv=nucl-th/0201080| doi = 10.1103/PhysRevC.65.044316|bibcode = 2002PhRvC..65d4316B |s2cid=119475976}}
Works
- {{cite book|editor=Iachello, F|title=The Interacting Boson Model: Interacting Bose-Fermi Systems in Nuclei|series=Ettore Majorana International Science Series, volume 10, Proceedings of a seminar, Erice, Italy, June 1980|publisher=Plenum Press|location=New York|year=1981}}{{cite journal|author=Klein, Abraham|author-link=Abraham Klein (physicist)|title=Review of The Interacting Boson Model: Interacting Bose-Fermi Systems in Nuclei edited by Francesco Iachello|journal=Science|date=2 April 1982|volume=216|issue=4541|page=46|doi=10.1126/science.216.4541.46.a|s2cid=239799719 }}
- {{cite book | title = The Interacting Boson Model| isbn = 978-0-521-30282-1 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=PXv_SRqDG_IC | author1 = Iachello, F | author2 = Arima, A | date = 2006-11-02| publisher = Cambridge University Press }} (1st edition 1987){{cite journal|title=Review of The Interacting Boson Model by F. Iachello and A. Arima|author=Bertsch, George|author-link=George F. Bertsch|journal=Physics Today|volume=41|issue=1|pages=80–81|date=January 1988|doi=10.1063/1.2811281 }} [https://doi.org/10.1063/1.2811281 p. 80] [https://physicstoday.scitation.org/doi/10.1063/1.2811282 p. 81]
- {{cite book | title = The interacting Boson-Fermion model| isbn =978-0-521-38092-8 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=U-UdAuaZQzwC | author1 = Iachello, F | author2 = Van Isacker, P | year = 1991}}
- {{cite book | title = Lie algebras and applications| isbn =978-3-540-36236-4 | url =https://books.google.com/books?id=PHLZ0cRxFksC | author1 = Iachello, F | year = 2006| publisher =Springer }}
- {{cite book | title = Algebraic theory of molecules| isbn =978-0-19-508091-9 | url =https://books.google.com/books?id=h_l87wF4d6oC | author1 = Iachello, F | author2 = Levine, Raphael D | year = 1995| publisher =Oxford University Press }}
- Arima; Iachello "Interacting boson model of collective states", Part 1 (the vibrational limit) Annals of physics Vol. 99, 1976, pp. 253–317, Part 2 (the rotational limit) ibid. Vol. 111, 1978, pp. 201–38, Part 3 with Scholten (the transition from SU(5) to SU(3)), ibid. Vol. 115, 1978, pp. 325–66, Part 4 (the O(6) limit) ibid. Vol. 123, 1979, pp. 468–92
- {{cite book | last1 = Arima | first1 = Akito | title = Topics in Nuclear Physics II a Comprehensive Review of Recent Developments | chapter = Interacting boson model | volume = 145 | pages = 858–867 | year = 1981 | doi = 10.1007/BFb0017234| series = Lecture Notes in Physics | isbn = 3-540-10853-X }}
References
{{reflist}}
External links
- [https://francesco.iachello.yale.edu/ Homepage at Yale]
- [https://history.aip.org/phn/11602006.html Biography from APS]
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Iachello, Francesco}}
Category:21st-century Italian engineers
Category:Italian expatriates in the United States
Category:20th-century Italian physicists
Category:Scientists from Sicily
Category:Members of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
Category:Italian nuclear physicists
Category:People from Francofonte
Category:Italian theoretical physicists
Category:Yale University faculty
Category:MIT Center for Theoretical Physics people