Eric J. Heller
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Eric J. Heller | |
| Born | 1946 |
|---|---|
| Nationality | American |
| Fields | Theoretical Chemist Physicist |
| Institutions | Harvard, UCLA, Los Alamos National Laboratory, University of Washington |
| Alma mater | Harvard University |
| Doctoral advisor | William P. Reinhardt |
| Known for | Pioneering a time-dependent perspective of molecular spectroscopy and reaction dynamics. |
| Notable awards | National Academy of Sciences (2006), American Chemical Society Award in Theoretical Chemistry (2005). |
Eric (Rick) Heller (b. 1946) is a full professor of chemistry and of physics at Harvard University. Heller is known for his work on time dependent quantum mechanics, and also for producing digital art based on the results of his numerical calculations.
Heller is principally known for pioneering a time-dependent wavepacket picture of quantum mechanics, which allowed the excited-state dynamics of large quantum mechanical systems to be understood without calculating eigenstates. Heller's work laid the foundations for a theoretical understanding of femtochemistry. Heller has also made seminal contributions to methodology, suggesting the technique called "frozen Gaussians"--today the most widely used semiclassical initial value representation (IVR) method of wavepacket propagation.
In physics, Heller is known for his work on quantum chaos, particularly on scar theory. Heller's more recent work has focused on the study of two dimensional electron gases, quantum mirages in quantum corrals, scattering theory, few-body quantum mechanics, semiclassical methods, and freak waves in the ocean. Many (though not all) of these studies make use of the time-dependent quantum mechanics ideas from his earlier work.
Heller is an elected member of the International Academy of Quantum Molecular Science, the National Academy of Sciences, and a number of other scientific societies. Prior to coming to Harvard in 1998, he held faculty positions at the University of Washington, Los Alamos National Laboratory, and the University of California, Los Angeles. At Harvard, he served as the director of the Institute for Theoretical Atomic Physics (ITAMP) from 1993-1998.
Heller's father was the economist Walter Heller.
