Wilhelm Lenz

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Wilhelm Lenz (8 February 1888 - 30 April 1957) was a German physicist, most notable for his invention of the Ising model^[1] and for his application of the Laplace-Runge-Lenz vector to the (old) quantum mechanical treatment of hydrogen-like atoms.^[2]

Lenz obtained his Ph.D. under Arnold Sommerfeld in 1911 and became his assistant. He did his habilitation in 1914 and became a professor at Rostock in 1920. The following year, he was called to be a professor at the newly founded Institute for Theoretical Physics at University of Hamburg, where he trained Ernst Ising and J. Hans D. Jensen; his assistants there included Wolfgang Pauli and Pascual Jordan. Together with Pauli and Otto Stern, Lenz built up the Institute into an international center for nuclear physics. He retired in 1956 and was succeeded in 1956 by Harry Lehmann.

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