Laudatio in Physikalische Blätter  38(1982) Nr. 4


The Max-Planck medal is awarded this year to Hans-Arwed Weidenmueller, born in Dresden in 1933, director at the Max-Planck-lnstitute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg and Professor of Theoretical Physics at Heidelberg University.

Weidenmueller first studied in Bonn, then as a student of Professor Jensen in Heidelberg.

He receives this highest award of the German Physical Society for his outstanding contributions to the theory of atomic nuclei. Of special importance are his contributions to nuclear beta decay, to the theory of nuclear reactions and their treatment in the framework of the shell model including the continuum, to isobaric analogue states and their spectroscopic properties, and to the effective interaction in nuclei and its perturbative treatment. Special mention also deserves the development of a microscopic statistical theory of nuclear reactions. In its application as a theory of transport phenomena, this theory has significantly broadened our understanding of the collisions between heavy nuclei. In addition to the treatment of heavy-ion reactions and the explanation of experimentally observed energy, angle, mass, and charge distributions of reaction products, the theory also allows for a treatment of isospin mixing of highly excited compound nuclei as a transport phenomenon.

With his numerous influential contributions, Hans-Arwed Weidenmüller has very much enriched nuclear theory in a broad way. Through their extremely lucid formulation and rich physical content, his papers have also much stimulated experimental nuclear physicists.

(translated to english from the german original)