Leon Cooper

American physicist (1930–2024)

Leon Cooper

Cooper in 2007

Born|

Leon N. Kupchik

(1930-02-28)February 28, 1930

New York City, U.S.

Died| October 23, 2024(2024-10-23) (aged 94)

Providence, Rhode Island, U.S.

Alma mater| Columbia University (BA, MA, PhD)
Known for| Cooper pairs
BCM theory
BCS theory
Awards| John Jay Award (1985)
Nobel Prize in Physics (1972)
Comstock Prize in Physics (1968)
Scientific career
Fields| Physics
Institutions| Brown University
Thesis|  Mu-Mesonic Atoms and the Electromagnetic Radius of the Nucleus  (1954)
Doctoral advisor| Robert Serber

Leon N. Cooper (né Kupchik; February 28, 1930 – October 23, 2024) was an American physicist and professor of Brown University. His name is associated with his work on superconductivity and neuroscience. He proposed the Cooper pair mechanism in 1956 and in 1972 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics with John Bardeen and John Robert Schrieffer for the development of the BCS theory of superconductivity.[1][2]

In neuroscience, Cooper co-developed the BCM theory of synaptic plasticity.[3]

## Life

[edit]

### Early life and education

[edit]

Leon N. Kupchick was born to a Jewish family in the Bronx, New York City on February 28, 1930.[4][5] While some sources have suggested the N. stood for "Neil", it was not short for anything.[5] His father immigrated to the United States from Belarus after the Russian Revolution, and his mother, who died when he was seven, was from Poland.[5] His father later changed the family's surname to Cooper.[5]

Cooper graduated from the Bronx High School of Science in 1947[6][7] and received a BA in 1951,[8] MA in 1953,[8] and PhD in 1954 from Columbia University.[8][9] His thesis was titled Mu-Mesonic Atoms and the Electromagnetic Radius of the Nucleus and his thesis advisor was Robert Serber.[10][11]

### Professional career

[edit]

Cooper spent a year at the Institute for Advanced Study and taught at the University of Illinois and Ohio State University before coming to Brown University in 1958.[9]

In 1974, Cooper became the Thomas J. Watson Sr. Professor of Science at Brown, and director of the Institute for Brain and Neural Systems which he founded in 1973.[8] Along with colleague Charles Elbaum, he founded the tech company Nestor, dedicated to finding commercial applications for artificial neural networks.[12] Nestor, along with Intel, developed the Ni1000 neural network computer chip in 1994.[13]

Cooper carried out research at various institutions including the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey, and at CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research) in Geneva, Switzerland.

### Personal life and death

[edit]

His first wife was Martha Kennedy, mother to his two daughters.[5] In 1969, Cooper married Kay Allard. [14] He died at his home in Providence, Rhode Island, on October 23, 2024, at the age of 94.[5]

## Work

[edit]

Cooper with his wife, Kay Allard, in 1972

As a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute of Advanced Study, he collaborated with professor John Bardeen and John Robert Schrieffer who was a graduate student at the time at the University of Illinois. The later two were working on superconductivity and asked Cooper for help. Cooper had never worked on superconductivity before that. After a year, he came up with a quasiparticle, now known as Cooper pairs, made of two bounded electrons, he publishes his provisional theory in Physical Review in September 1956.[5] In July 1957, Bardeen, Schrieffer and Cooper submitted their final theory in Physical Reviews called "Theory of superconductivty".[5] This theory became known as the BCS theory after the authors initials. Their theory explained conventional superconductivity that was unexplained since its experimental discovery in 1911. This work earned Bardeen, Schrieffer and Cooper a Nobel Prize in Physics in 1972.[5]

While working at Brown University, Cooper became interested in neuroscience and the process of learning. With two doctoral students, Elie Bienenstock and Paul Munro, Cooper published their theory of synaptic plasticity in 1982 in The Journal of Neuroscience. This theory became known as the BCM theory for Bienenstock, Cooper and Munro.[5] They proposed estimated the weakening and strengthening that could occur without saturation of the connections. As synapses saturate, electrical connections become less effective, reducing saturation. Connections oscillate between saturation and unsaturation without reaching their limits. Their theory explained for how the visual cortex works and how people learn to see. Their theory became foundational in the field of neuroscience.[5]

## Memberships and honors

[edit]

* Fellow of the American Physical Society
* Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
* Member of the National Academy of Sciences
* Member of the American Philosophical Society
* Member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science
* Associate member of the Neuroscience Research Program
* Research fellow of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation (1959–1966)
* Fellow of the Guggenheim Institute (1965–66)
* Nobel Prize Recipient for Physics (1972)[8]
* Co-winner (with Dr. Schrieffer) of the Comstock Prize in Physics of the National Academy of Sciences (1968)[15]
* Received the Award of Excellence, Graduate Faculties Alumni of Columbia University
* Received the Descartes Medal, Academie de Paris, Université René Descartes.
* Received the John Jay Award of Columbia College (1985)[8]
* Recipient of seven honorary doctorates[8]

## Publications

[edit]

Cooper was the author of Science and Human Experience – a collection of essays, including previously unpublished material, on issues such as consciousness and the structure of space. (Cambridge University Press, 2014).

Cooper also wrote an unconventional liberal-arts physics textbook, originally An Introduction to the Meaning and Structure of Physics (Harper and Row, 1968)[16] and still in print in a somewhat condensed form as Physics: Structure and Meaning (Lebanon: New Hampshire, University Press of New England, 1992).

* Cooper, L. N. & J. Rainwater. "Theory of Multiple Coulomb Scattering from Extended Nuclei", Nevis Cyclotron Laboratories at Columbia University, Office of Naval Research (ONR), United States Department of Energy (through predecessor agency the Atomic Energy Commission), (August 1954).
* Cooper, Leon N. (1956). "Bound Electron Pairs in a Degenerate Fermi Gas". Physical Review. 104 (4): 1189–1190. Bibcode:1956PhRv..104.1189C. doi:10.1103/PhysRev.104.1189.
* Bardeen, J.; Cooper, L. N.; Schrieffer, J. R. (1957). "Microscopic Theory of Superconductivity". Physical Review. 106 (1): 162–164. Bibcode:1957PhRv..106..162B. doi:10.1103/PhysRev.106.162.
* Bardeen, J.; Cooper, L. N.; Schrieffer, J. R. (1957). "Theory of Superconductivity". Physical Review. 108 (5): 1175–1204. Bibcode:1957PhRv..108.1175B. doi:10.1103/PhysRev.108.1175.
* Cooper, L. N., Lee, H. J., Schwartz, B. B. & W. Silvert. "Theory of the Knight Shift and Flux Quantization in Superconductors", Brown University, United States Department of Energy (through predecessor agency the Atomic Energy Commission), (May 1962).
* Cooper, L. N. & Feldman, D. "BCS: 50 years", World Scientific Publishing Co., (November 2010).

## See also

[edit]

* List of Jewish Nobel laureates

## References

[edit]

1. ^ "Superconductivity". CERN official website. CERN. July 21, 2023.
2. ^ Weinberg, Steven (February 2008). "From BSC to the LHC". CERN Courier. 48 (1): 17–21.
3. ^ Bienenstock, Elie (1982). "Theory for the development of neuron selectivity: orientation specificity and binocular interaction in visual cortex". The Journal of Neuroscience. 2 (1): 32–48. doi:10.1523/JNEUROSCI.02-01-00032.1982. PMC 6564292. PMID 7054394.
4. ^ "Jewish Nobel Prize Winners in Physics". www.jinfo.org. Retrieved March 29, 2023.
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k McClain, Dylan Loeb (October 25, 2024). "Leon Cooper Dies at 94; Nobelist Unlocked Secrets of Superconductivity". The New York Times. Retrieved October 25, 2024.
6. ^ "Bronx Science Honored as Historic Physics Site by the American Physical Society". bxscience.edu. Retrieved July 27, 2012.
7. ^ MacDonald, Kerri (October 15, 2010). "A Nobel Laureate Returns Home to Bronx Science". The New York Times. Retrieved July 27, 2012.
8. ^ a b c d e f g "Leon Cooper". research.brown.edu. Retrieved July 27, 2012.
9. ^ a b Vanderkam, Laura (July 15, 2008). "From Biology to Physics and Back Again: Leon Cooper". Scientific American. Retrieved July 27, 2012.
10. ^ "Cooper, Leon N. (Leon Neil), 1930-". history.aip.org. Retrieved November 1, 2024.
11. ^ Leon Cooper at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
12. ^ Johnson, Colin (October 17, 1988). "Neural Network Startups Proliferate Across The U.S." The Scientist. 2 (19). Retrieved March 8, 2018.
13. ^ "Nestor's neural chip destiny now in its own hands". Tech Monitor. April 14, 1994. Retrieved October 20, 2022.
14. ^ Carey, Charles W. (2014). American Scientists. Infobase Publishing. p. 66\. ISBN 978-1-4381-0807-0.
15. ^ "Comstock Prize in Physics". National Academy of Sciences. Archived from the original on December 29, 2010.
16. ^ Cushing, James T. (1978). "Review of An Introduction to the Meaning and Structure of Physics by Leon N. Cooper". American Journal of Physics. 46 (1): 114–115. Bibcode:1978AmJPh..46..114C. doi:10.1119/1.11116.

## External links

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Wikimedia Commons has media related to Leon Cooper.

Wikiquote has quotations related to Leon Cooper.

* Leon Cooper on Nobelprize.org  including the Nobel Lecture, December 11, 1972 Microscopic Quantum Interference Effects in the Theory of Superconductivity
* Brown University researcher profile
* Brown University Physics Department profile
* Critical Review evaluations[permanent dead link] of Professor Cooper
* Leon Cooper at the Mathematics Genealogy Project

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Laureates of the Nobel Prize in Physics

1901–1925|

* 1901: Röntgen
* 1902: Lorentz / Zeeman
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* 1951: Cockcroft / Walton
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* 1956: Shockley / Bardeen / Brattain
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1972 Nobel Prize laureates

Chemistry|

* Christian B. Anfinsen (United States)
* Stanford Moore (United States)
* William Howard Stein (United States)

Literature (1972)|

* Heinrich Böll (Germany)

Peace|

* None

Physics|

* John Bardeen (United States)
* Leon Cooper (United States)
* John Robert Schrieffer (United States)

Physiology or Medicine|

* Gerald Edelman (United States)
* Rodney Robert Porter (United Kingdom)

Economic Sciences|

* John Hicks (United Kingdom)
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