Charles Thompson Prewitt (March 3, 1933 – April 28, 2022) was an American mineralogist and solid state chemist known for his work on structural chemistry of minerals and

high-pressure chemistry High-pressure chemistry is concerned with those chemical processes that are carried out under high pressure – pressures in the thousands of bars (100 k Pa) or higher. High-pressure processes are generally faster and have a higher conversion ef ...

Education and career

Prewitt studied geology at

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a Private university, private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Established in 1861, MIT has played a significant role in the development of many areas of moder ...

as an undergraduate and received his PhD in 1962 in crystallography at the same place under the supervision of Martin Buerger, where he worked on the structure determination of

wollastonite Wollastonite is a calcium Silicate minerals, inosilicate mineral (calcium, Casilicon, Sioxygen, O3) that may contain small amounts of iron, magnesium, and manganese substituting for calcium. It is usually white. It forms when impure limestone or D ...

s and

pectolite Pectolite is a white to gray mineral, Na Ca2 Si3 O8(O H), a sodium calcium hydroxide inosilicate. It crystallizes in the triclinic system typically occurring in radiated or fibrous crystalline masses. It has a Mohs hardness of 4.5 to 5 and a spec ...

s. He moved to

DuPont Dupont, DuPont, Du Pont, duPont, or du Pont may refer to: People * Dupont (surname) Dupont, also spelled as DuPont, duPont, Du Pont, or du Pont is a French surname meaning "of the bridge", historically indicating that the holder of the surname re ...

Central Research Laboratory in

Wilmington, Delaware Wilmington is the List of municipalities in Delaware, most populous city in the U.S. state of Delaware. The city was built on the site of Fort Christina, the first Swedish colonization of the Americas, Swedish settlement in North America. It lie ...

, where he worked with Robert D. Shannon to compile the effective

ionic radii Ionic radius, ''r''ion, is the radius of a monatomic ion in an ionic crystal structure. Although neither atoms nor ions have sharp boundaries, they are treated as if they were hard spheres with radii such that the sum of ionic radii of the cation ...

, which became an important foundation of modern crystal chemistry. Afterwards, Prewitt became a professor at

Stony Brook University Stony Brook University (SBU), officially the State University of New York at Stony Brook, is a public university, public research university in Stony Brook, New York, United States, on Long Island. Along with the University at Buffalo, it is on ...

in 1969. In 1986, he was hired by the Carnegie Institute of Science to head the Geophysics Laboratory until 1998. He later became an adjunt faculty member at

University of Arizona The University of Arizona (Arizona, U of A, UArizona, or UA) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Tucson, Arizona, United States. Founded in 1885 by the 13th Arizona Territorial Legislature, it ...

Honors and awards

Prewitt was a Fellow of the

Japan Society for the Promotion of Science The is an Independent Administrative Institution in Japan, established for the purpose of contributing to the advancement of science in all fields of the natural and social sciences and the humanities.JSPSweb page History The Japan Society f ...

in 1983. He was the vice president and president of the

Mineralogical Society of America The Mineralogical Society of America (MSA) is a scientific membership organization. MSA was founded in 1919 for the advancement of mineralogy, crystallography, geochemistry, and petrology, and promotion of their uses in other sciences, industry, ...

in 1983 and 1984, respectively. He was awarded the

Roebling Medal The Roebling Medal is the highest award of the Mineralogical Society of America for scientific eminence as represented primarily by scientific publication of outstanding original research in mineralogy. The award is named for Colonel Washington A. ...

from the

in 2003. He received the inaugural Medal for Excellence from the

International Mineralogical Association Founded in 1958, the International Mineralogical Association (IMA) is an international group of 40 national societies. The goal is to promote the science of mineralogy and to standardize the nomenclature of the 5000 plus known mineral species. ...

in 2008.

Bibliography

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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Prewitt, Charles T. 1933 births 2022 deaths Massachusetts Institute of Technology alumni University of Arizona faculty DuPont people Stony Brook University faculty American mineralogists American inorganic chemists 20th-century American chemists People from Lexington, Kentucky American chemists Solid state chemists