Keith Adam Nelson is an American

physical chemist Physical chemistry is the study of macroscopic and microscopic phenomena in chemical systems in terms of the principles, practices, and concepts of physics such as motion, energy, force, time, thermodynamics, quantum chemistry, statistical mecha ...

, currently the Haslam and Dewey Professor of Chemistry 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 ...

Education and career

Nelson studied chemistry at

Stanford University Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...

and received his B.S. in 1976, followed by a Ph.D. in

physical chemistry Physical chemistry is the study of macroscopic and microscopic phenomena in chemical systems in terms of the principles, practices, and concepts of physics such as motion, energy, force, time, thermodynamics, quantum chemistry, statistical mech ...

at the same university in 1981. His thesis was supervised by

Michael D. Fayer Michael David Fayer (born September 12, 1947) is an American chemical physicist. He is the David Mulvane Ehrsam and Edward Curtis Franklin Professor of Chemistry at Stanford University. Education and academic career He attended the University of ...

. Nelson then spent a year at

University of California, Los Angeles The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Its academic roots were established in 1881 as a normal school the ...

, as a postdoc with John P. McTague before joining

as a faculty member in the department of chemistry in 1982.

Honors and awards

Nelson won the 2021 William F. Meggers Award from the

Optical Society of America Optica, founded as the Optical Society of America (later the Optical Society), is a professional society of individuals and companies with an interest in optics and photonics. It publishes journals, organizes conferences and exhibitions, and ca ...

"for expanding the horizons of impulsive stimulated Raman scattering (ISRS) to the generation of intense tunable terahertz pulses, thus establishing new transient-grating techniques for a more effective application of time-domain coherent nonlinear spectroscopy in the study of condensed phase molecular dynamics".

References

Year of birth missing (living people) Living people Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Science faculty 21st-century American chemists Stanford University alumni {{US-chemist-stub