RETROSPECTIVE Technology and appointed U.S. Science En- voy to the Middle East. He still found time to write some 600 research articles and Ahmed H. Zewail (1946–2016) 14 books. Zewail was passionate about his next discovery in chemical physics—seeing A Nobel laureate, who pioneered femtochemistry, structures with electrons in the four dimen- sions of time and space. He and his group promoted a scientific renaissance in the Middle East developed femtosecond electron diffraction for direct imaging of the architecture of By Peter B. Dervan a probe pulse—Zewail photographed snap- biological molecules or materials changing shots of the evolution of chemical reactions. with time. hmed H. Zewail, an Egyptian-Amer- Zewail’s hero and friend, Caltech’s Linus Ahmed was a brilliant scientist who com- ican scientist who won the 1999 No- Pauling, won the Nobel Prize in 1954 for bined vision, hard work, and optimism in bel Prize in Chemistry for pioneering his research on the nature of the chemical his research. Ahmed and I were colleagues investigations of fundamental chemi- bond. Zewail connected the chemical bond together for 40 years at Caltech, and I was cal reactions on the femtosecond to its dynamics by setting those bonds in fortunate to hear his thoughts about the time scale, died on 2 August 2016. He motion. importance of fundamental research, the Awas 70 years old. Zewail was an academic Zewail received honors from around widening gap between the haves and have star at the California Institute of Technol- the globe, including 46 honorary degrees, nots, and his hopes for the Middle East. ogy (Caltech) and spent his final years advo- the Grand Collar of the Order of the Nile Although he loved America and was grate- cating for investment in science education (Egypt’s highest state honor), and the Or- ful to be at Caltech for 40 years, his com- and research in Egypt. der of Légion d’Honneur. He was an elected mitment to Egypt, the country of his birth, Zewail was born in 1946 in Damanhur, member of academies and learned societ- never wavered. Egypt, and studied at Alexandria University ies including the U.S. National Academy of In a 2013 op-ed, Zewail wrote, “A part in the city where he grew up. After earning Sciences, the Royal Society of London, the of the world that pioneered science and
bachelor’s and master’s degrees, he looked American Philosophical Society, the French mathematics during Europe’s dark ages on September 8, 2016 abroad to pursue his Ph.D. in chemistry. is now lost in a dark age of illiteracy and Egyptians seeking overseas education in knowledge deficiency.” Ahmed’s message 1969 typically went to the Soviet Union. to the Arab world was to build a “scientific In a stroke of good fortune, the University society.” Shortly after receiving the Nobel, of Pennsylvania offered him a scholarship he proposed to President Mubarak the cre- and he came to the United States. After ation of a science and technology institute earning his doctorate from Penn, he spent in Egypt. He imagined a private research in- 2 years as a postdoctoral researcher at the stitute unimpeded by bureaucracy and po- University of California, Berkeley, and then litical instability—a Caltech model in Egypt. joined the faculty at Caltech in Pasadena in During the 2011 Egyptian revolution, he 1976. Zewail, the Linus Pauling Professor of supported the students’ goals—democracy, Chemistry and professor of physics, set out and social and economic change. In 2013, http://science.sciencemag.org/ to make movies of chemical reactions with the Zewail City of Science and Technology the world’s fastest camera—one with shut- began enrolling students in biomedicine, ter speed measured in femtoseconds, a mil- solar energy, nanotechnology, and other lionth of a billionth of a second. fields. The question remains whether his Before Zewail’s work, chemists could dream for an independent Egyptian science only infer the structures of short-lived in- and technology institute will live on.
termediates between reactants and prod- Like his role model Benjamin Franklin, Downloaded from ucts during the breaking and making of Ahmed Zewail was an intellectual and a
OMM ON S bonds in chemical reactions. Transition statesman who made important contribu- C states are so fleeting that they had never tions to both science and society. He was a been observed directly. A femtosecond is charismatic person with an infectious laugh shorter than the period of a nuclear vibra- and a sonorous voice. All his colleagues de-
T I ON / W K ME D A tion or rotation in the molecule and Zewail Academy, the Russian Academy, the Chi- lighted to be in his presence. His personal A
U N D was able to freeze the system in time using nese Academy, and the Swedish Academy. warmth made everyone feel like they were O ultrafast laser spectroscopy. Zewail’s bril- Among his more than 100 international his best friend. Caltech, the scientific com- G E F A liant insight was the demonstration that prizes and awards, he was recipient of the munity, and the entire Arab world deeply
H E R I T rotational and vibrational coherence is the Benjamin Franklin Medal, the Leonardo da mourn his loss. He was buried in Egypt A L key to making femtosecond movies. He was Vinci Award, the Robert A. Welch Award, with a full military funeral on 7 August able to choreograph an ensemble of mol- the Wolf Prize, the King Faisal Prize, and 2016. Ahmed Zewail was the first Egyptian C H E MI / ecules and synchronize their motion. Using the Priestley Medal. and the first Arab to win a Nobel Prize in two laser pulses—a pump pulse to start the After the Nobel in 1999, Zewail became the sciences. OC K A R D L
A . clock and trigger the reaction, followed by an outspoken leader in global affairs, par- He is survived by his wife, Dema Faham, S ticularly as they relate to progress in science and four children: Maha, Amani, Nabeel, G L A U and education in the developing world. In and Hani. j Division of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, O: D O
T California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA. 2009, he was appointed to Obama’s Presi-
P H O Email: [email protected] dent’s Council of Advisors on Science and 10.1126/science.aai8466
SCIENCE sciencemag.org 9 SEPTEMBER 2016 • VOL 353 ISSUE 6304 1103
Published by AAAS Ahmed H. Zewail (1946−2016) Peter B. Dervan (September 8, 2016) Science 353 (6304), 1103. [doi: 10.1126/science.aai8466]
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