
George C. Pimentel
Wolf Prize Laureate in Chemistry 1982

George C. Pimentel
Affiliation at the time of the award:
University of California, USA
Award citation:
“for development of matrix isolation spectroscopy and for the discovery of photodissociation lasers and chemical lasers”.
Prize share:
George C. Pimentel
John C. Polanyi
Professor George Claude Pimentel has made pioneering contributions to molecular spectroscopy and laser chemistry. In 1954 he developed the matrix isolation technique by which spectra of free radicals and unstable molecules at very low temperatures can be detected. In 1964-1965 Pimentel created the first photodissociation and chemical lasers. These are amongst the most efficient and powerful lasers known. The chemical laser was subsequently developed by Pimentel and collaborators as a most sensitive tool for the microscopic elucidation of chemical reaction processes. Both chemical lasers and the iodine photodissociation laser figure importantly in current efforts to achieve power generation by laser induced nuclear fusion reactions.
