# Albert Overhauser
**Albert Warner Overhauser** (1925–2011) was an American condensed matter physicist, Stuart Distinguished Professor of Physics at [Purdue University](https://www.edgepedia.org/purdue-university), and the originator of dynamic nuclear polarization, the effect known worldwide as the Overhauser effect.[1](http://physics.purdue.edu/about/history/albert_w_overhauser.html) • [2](https://physicstoday.aip.org/obituaries/obituary-of-albert-overhauser-1925-2011) Elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1976, he received the Oliver E. Buckley Solid State Physics Prize in 1975 and the National Medal of Science in 1994.[1](http://physics.purdue.edu/about/history/albert_w_overhauser.html) • [3](https://www.nsf.gov/honorary-awards/national-medal-science/recipients/albert-w-overhauser)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Born – died | 1925 (San Diego, raised in San Francisco) – December 10, 2011, West Lafayette, Indiana[4](https://www.purdue.edu/science/Alumni/recognition/honorary_doctorates/albert-overhauser.html) • [2](https://physicstoday.aip.org/obituaries/obituary-of-albert-overhauser-1925-2011) |
| Signature work | "Polarization of Nuclei in Metals," *Physical Review* 92, 411 (1953), the prediction of dynamic nuclear polarization[5](https://journals.aps.org/pr/abstract/10.1103/PhysRev.92.411) |
| Effect size | Nuclear polarization enhanced about 1,000-fold, the ratio of electronic to nuclear magnetic moments[1](http://physics.purdue.edu/about/history/albert_w_overhauser.html) |
| Training | Ph.D., University of California, Berkeley, 1951, advisor Charles Kittel[6](https://mathgenealogy.org/id.php?id=124997) |
| Career | Illinois postdoc 1951–53; Cornell 1953–58; Ford Motor Co. Scientific Research Staff 1958–73; Purdue from 1973[1](http://physics.purdue.edu/about/history/albert_w_overhauser.html) |
| Honors | Buckley Prize (1975); NAS election (1976); National Medal of Science (1994); Russell Varian Prize (2009)[1](http://physics.purdue.edu/about/history/albert_w_overhauser.html) • [2](https://physicstoday.aip.org/obituaries/obituary-of-albert-overhauser-1925-2011) |
| Other concepts | Spin- and charge-density waves (1960); shell model of lattice dynamics; COW neutron gravity experiment[2](https://physicstoday.aip.org/obituaries/obituary-of-albert-overhauser-1925-2011) |
## Early life and education
Overhauser was born in San Diego and raised in San Francisco.[4](https://www.purdue.edu/science/Alumni/recognition/honorary_doctorates/albert-overhauser.html) He entered the [University of California](https://www.edgepedia.org/university-of-california), Berkeley in 1942; his studies were interrupted by service in the U.S. Naval Reserve from 1944 to 1946 as a radar repair specialist.[1](http://physics.purdue.edu/about/history/albert_w_overhauser.html) He returned to take a bachelor's degree Magna Cum Laude in Physics and in [Mathematics](https://www.edgepedia.org/mathematics) in 1948, and stayed on for graduate work with [Charles Kittel](https://www.edgepedia.org/charles-kittel), receiving his Ph.D. in 1951 with a dissertation, *Studies in the Electron Theory of Metals*, on the electron theory of metals.[4](https://www.purdue.edu/science/Alumni/recognition/honorary_doctorates/albert-overhauser.html) • [6](https://mathgenealogy.org/id.php?id=124997) • [7](https://www.proquest.com/docview/302053158/)
## Career
His professional career began with a postdoctoral appointment at the University of Illinois from 1951 to 1953, where he developed his theory of dynamic nuclear polarization.[1](http://physics.purdue.edu/about/history/albert_w_overhauser.html) In 1953 he moved to Cornell University as an Assistant Professor and was promoted to Associate Professor three years later.[1](http://physics.purdue.edu/about/history/albert_w_overhauser.html)
In 1958 he left academia for the Scientific Research Staff of the [Ford Motor Company](https://www.edgepedia.org/ford-motor-company) in [Dearborn, Michigan](https://www.edgepedia.org/dearborn-michigan), an industrial laboratory where he rose to Manager of Mathematical and Theoretical Sciences in 1962, Assistant Director of the Physical Science Laboratory in 1969, and Director in 1972.[1](http://physics.purdue.edu/about/history/albert_w_overhauser.html) He left Ford in 1973 to become Professor of Physics at Purdue University, and the following year was named the Stuart Distinguished Professor of Physics, a chair he held until 2004 and from which he remained active as professor emeritus until his death.[1](http://physics.purdue.edu/about/history/albert_w_overhauser.html) • [4](https://www.purdue.edu/science/Alumni/recognition/honorary_doctorates/albert-overhauser.html) • [2](https://physicstoday.aip.org/obituaries/obituary-of-albert-overhauser-1925-2011)
## The Overhauser effect
The Overhauser effect is the transfer of polarization from electron spins to nuclear spins. In his 1953 *Physical Review* paper "Polarization of Nuclei in Metals," written while he was at Illinois and about to move to Cornell, Overhauser showed that if the electron spin resonance of a metal's conduction electrons is saturated, for example by microwave irradiation, the nuclei become polarized to the same degree they would be if their gyromagnetic ratio (ratio of a particle's magnetic moment to its spin) were that of the electron spin.[5](https://journals.aps.org/pr/abstract/10.1103/PhysRev.92.411) Because the electron magnetic moment is roughly a thousand times the nuclear moment, this means nuclear polarization can be enhanced by a factor of about 1,000 through electron-nuclear spin coupling.[1](http://physics.purdue.edu/about/history/albert_w_overhauser.html) • [8](https://nationalmedals.org/laureate/albert-w-overhauser/) The idea was soon confirmed experimentally by T. P. Carver and C. P. Slichter in DNP experiments on lithium metal.[9](https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0034-4885/77/7/072501) • [10](https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1742-6596/324/1/012003/pdf)
According to *Dynamic nuclear polarization: Yesterday, today, and tomorrow* ([Journal of Physics: Conference Series](https://www.edgepedia.org/journal-of-physics-conference-series), 2011), Abragam later proposed a variant using dipole-dipole electron-nuclear interactions that works in liquids, with maximum enhancement −ωS/2ωI; the same mechanism applied to nucleus-nucleus interactions is the Nuclear Overhauser Effect ([NOE](https://www.edgepedia.org/nuclear-overhauser-effect)), a standard tool of solution NMR.[10](https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1742-6596/324/1/012003/pdf)
## Representative work
Beyond the 1953 paper, three lines of work stand out.
**Density waves.** In 1960, at Ford, Overhauser introduced the modern concepts of spin- and charge-density waves (SDW and CDW), spontaneously broken-symmetry states of the interacting electron gas, and showed in his Hartree-Fock instability theorem that the [Slater determinant](https://www.edgepedia.org/slater-determinant) of plane waves is not a stable ground state. Spin-density waves were observed in chromium soon afterward.[2](https://physicstoday.aip.org/obituaries/obituary-of-albert-overhauser-1925-2011) • [1](http://physics.purdue.edu/about/history/albert_w_overhauser.html)
**The shell model.** At Cornell, with his student Bertram G. Dick, he developed the "shell model" for the dynamics of bound electrons, allowing a tenfold improvement in the parameterization of lattice dynamics in semiconductors.[2](https://physicstoday.aip.org/obituaries/obituary-of-albert-overhauser-1925-2011)
**Gravity and quantum interference.** At Purdue, with Roberto Colella and Samuel A. Werner, he carried out the COW experiment, which observed the effect of a tiny change in gravitational potential on a neutron beam's self-interference pattern, showing for the first time that gravity plays a role in quantum mechanics.[1](http://physics.purdue.edu/about/history/albert_w_overhauser.html) • [2](https://physicstoday.aip.org/obituaries/obituary-of-albert-overhauser-1925-2011)
## Honors and recognition
Overhauser received the Oliver E. Buckley Solid State Physics Prize of the [American Physical Society](https://www.edgepedia.org/american-physical-society) in April 1975 and was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1976, the only person in the history of the Purdue physics department so elected; the American Academy of Arts and Sciences elected him in 1977.[1](http://physics.purdue.edu/about/history/albert_w_overhauser.html) • [11](https://www.amacad.org/person/albert-warner-overhauser) Further honors included the Alexander von Humboldt Senior Scientist Award (1979–80), an Honorary Doctor of Science from the University of Chicago (1979), an Honorary Doctor of Laws from [Simon Fraser University](https://www.edgepedia.org/simon-fraser-university) (1998), and the Russell Varian Prize from the European Magnetic Resonance Congress in 2009.[1](http://physics.purdue.edu/about/history/albert_w_overhauser.html) • [12](https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/anie.201201885) He served the American Physical Society as Counselor-at-Large from 1982 to 1986.[1](http://physics.purdue.edu/about/history/albert_w_overhauser.html)
## Legacy in modern science
[Dynamic nuclear polarization](https://www.edgepedia.org/dynamic-nuclear-polarization) is now one of the most prominent methods of sensitivity enhancement in NMR.[13](https://www.annualreviews.org/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-physchem-071119-040222) The Nuclear Overhauser Effect is used to determine the structures of proteins and other molecules in solution.[1](http://physics.purdue.edu/about/history/albert_w_overhauser.html) • [10](https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1742-6596/324/1/012003/pdf) Overhauser-effect magnetometers exploit the effect for precision field measurement; a commercial instrument, the GEM Systems GSM-11, advertises accuracy of 10⁻¹⁰ Tesla.[1](http://physics.purdue.edu/about/history/albert_w_overhauser.html) In research laboratories, high-field liquid-state Overhauser DNP, demonstrated at about 7 and 11 Tesla, extends the original liquid-phase mechanism to one- and two-dimensional NMR of drugs, natural products, and heterogeneous catalysis, while solid-state DNP under magic-angle spinning has become a tool for structural studies of biomolecules and materials.[14](https://weizmann.elsevierpure.com/en/publications/recent-progress-in-high-field-liquid-state-overhauser-dynamic-nuc/) • [13](https://www.annualreviews.org/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-physchem-071119-040222)
His doctoral students at Cornell and Harvard included Henry Ehrenreich (1955), John Hopfield (1958), Edward Charles McIrvine (1959), and Lonnie Van Zandt (1964).[6](https://mathgenealogy.org/id.php?id=124997)
## References
1. "Albert W. Overhauser," Department of Physics and Astronomy, Purdue University. http://physics.purdue.edu/about/history/albert_w_overhauser.html
2. "Obituary of Albert Overhauser (1925–2011)," *Physics Today*. https://physicstoday.aip.org/obituaries/obituary-of-albert-overhauser-1925-2011
3. "Albert W. Overhauser," National Medal of Science, U.S. National Science Foundation. https://www.nsf.gov/honorary-awards/national-medal-science/recipients/albert-w-overhauser
4. "Albert W. Overhauser," College of Science, Purdue University. https://www.purdue.edu/science/Alumni/recognition/honorary_doctorates/albert-overhauser.html
5. Overhauser, A. W., "Polarization of Nuclei in Metals," *Physical Review* 92, 411 (1953). https://journals.aps.org/pr/abstract/10.1103/PhysRev.92.411
6. "Albert Overhauser," The Mathematics Genealogy Project. https://mathgenealogy.org/id.php?id=124997
7. ProQuest record, "Studies in the Electron Theory of Metals," University of California, Berkeley. https://www.proquest.com/docview/302053158/
8. "Albert W. Overhauser," National Science and Technology Medals Foundation. https://nationalmedals.org/laureate/albert-w-overhauser/
9. "The discovery and renaissance of dynamic nuclear polarization," *Reports on Progress in Physics* 77, 072501 (2014). https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0034-4885/77/7/072501
10. "Dynamic nuclear polarization: Yesterday, today, and tomorrow," *Journal of Physics: Conference Series* 324, 012003 (2011). https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1742-6596/324/1/012003/pdf
11. "Albert Warner Overhauser," American Academy of Arts and Sciences. https://www.amacad.org/person/albert-warner-overhauser
12. "Albert W. Overhauser (1925–2011)," *Angewandte Chemie International Edition* (2012). https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/anie.201201885
13. "High-Field Dynamic Nuclear Polarization," *Annual Review of Physical Chemistry*. https://www.annualreviews.org/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-physchem-071119-040222
14. "Recent progress in high-field liquid-state Overhauser dynamic nuclear polarization," Weizmann Institute of Science. https://weizmann.elsevierpure.com/en/publications/recent-progress-in-high-field-liquid-state-overhauser-dynamic-nuc/
15. "Perspectives on the Dynamic Nuclear Polarization Mechanisms of Monoradicals: Overhauser Effect or Thermal Mixing?" OSTI.GOV. https://www.osti.gov/biblio/2540158
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Physical world and mathematics › Physical and mathematical scientists › Physicists and astronomers › Researchers in condensed matter physics and quantum materials › Strongly correlated electron systems and quantum magnetism*
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