Alex Pines 1945-2024
Alex Pines, formerly the Glenn T. Seaborg Emeritus Professor of Chemistry, had a remarkable career as a groundbreaking researcher and beloved teacher. Pines was a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the Royal Society; held honorary degrees from the Universities of Rome, Paris, Marseilles, Amritsar, and the Weizmann Institute of Science; and his many awards included the Wolf Prize in Chemistry. In his honor, the Pines Magnetic Resonance Center (PMRC) at Berkeley was launched on November 28, 2023, at a gathering for the Alexander Pines Endowed Lecture in Physical Chemistry, presented by Lyndon Emsley, professor at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne.
While he was at MIT, Pines co-wrote a landmark paper describing time reversal in a seemingly irreversible process. The paper, entitled “Violation of the Spin Temperature Hypothesis,” demonstrated the Loschmidt demon or paradox, which contradicts the second law of thermodynamics. The Loschmidt demon presents a challenge that scientists have wrestled with since the late 19th century, following on the work of Ludwig Boltzmann, creator of statistical mechanics.
For his subsequent research at Berkeley, Pines insisted that credit go to the self-dubbed “Pinenuts,” the students and postdocs who came through his lab over 50 years, many of whom continue to flourish as leaders in academia, industry, and government. Pines and the Pinenuts are known for multiple quantum spectroscopy, wherein groups of nuclear spins flip while absorbing groups of radio frequency quanta. These concepts and methods are used in an array of areas, including quantum information processing, a growing area of research that brings together quantum mechanics and information theory. Pines and his dynamic team have repeatedly reframed assumptions about the essential behavior of the molecules that govern our world. Their ongoing contributions to solid state NMR include expanding the reach of the technology to analyze molecules that have nuclei that were previously considered not suitable for NMR analysis. Using simultaneous rotation of a given sample around two axes in space, the Pines group took a novel approach that enables imaging by emulating the symmetry of a geometric solid described by Plato, the icosahedron. Pines and his group also invented zero-field NMR — that is NMR without a magnet, which initially sounded very far-fetched, but is now an exciting methodology being deployed in areas from analytical chemistry to fundamental atomic physics. While their approaches in zero-field and solid state NMR were initially met by the magnetic resonance community with skepticism, Pines and the Pinenuts have repeatedly proved successful at turning seemingly impossible ideas into viable experiments.
While he began at Berkeley teaching graduate students, Pines enthusiastically shared his love for chemistry with undergraduates. The large lecture halls of foundational chemistry courses he taught were abuzz with students in Chemistry 1A responding to his “ChemQuizzes” — opportunities to solve problems together in class and then share their insights with the group as a whole. It’s no surprise that Pines’ many accolades include Berkeley’s Distinguished Teaching Award — his charisma, magnetic personality, openness, and enthusiasm for his subject were infectious.
Alex Pines, his wife Ditsa, and friends and family gathered for the launch of the PMRC,
November 2023.
excerpted and edited from https://inspire.berkeley.edu/o/new-pines-center-at-the-college-of-chemistry-resonates-with-promise/
original text by Elizabeth Costello.
International Society of Magnetic Resonance Obituary
ISSN 0432-7136
Prof. Alexander Pines (22.6.1945 - 1.11.2024)
Our cherished colleague Alexander Pines, the Glenn Seaborg Professor of Chemistry Emeritus at the University of California Berkeley, passed away on November 1. From his time as a student with John Waugh at MIT until just days before his passing, Alex was an irresistible force in magnetic resonance, perhaps most broadly recognized by his receipt of the Wolf Prize in chemistry in 1991.
Professor Pines emerged in the magnetic resonance community at a time just after the physics community established “nuclear Zeeman spectroscopy” as NMR and the fundamentals were ripe for transitioning to other disciplines. Alex began thinking about spins as an undergraduate at The Hebrew University, publishing a JACS article on hindered rotation in small molecule liquids NMR. A gifted pianist, Alex could have pursued music as profession, yet instead decided to pursue a Ph.D. in chemistry. During his thesis years at MIT, however, Alex spanned the world of quantum and statistical physics where he, along with W-Q. Rhim, reversed the dynamics of a system on interacting particles (Phys Rev Lett, 1970); this in turn opened the
way for observation of chemical shifts, such as 19F, in solids (JCP, 1971). He revealed the chemical shift anisotropy in carbon-13 as a tool for chemistry (also JCP, 1971); chemical applications of chemical shifts in solids was in turn was advanced by his demonstration of cross-polarization of dilute spines (Jour. Chem Phys, 1973). This paper has been cited over four thousand times.
Professor Pines began his independent academic career at the University of California Berkeley in 1972 as an assistant professor in chemistry: no postdoc necessary – such was the impact of his intellect on his new colleagues. For the next fifty years Professor Pines was the mentor to an astonishing collection of emerging scholars, publishing works spanning multiple-quantum spectroscopy, zero-field NMR, broadband and adiabatic sech/tanh pulses for MRI, double rotation and dynamic-angle spinning of quadrupolar nuclei, and iterative maps for quantum control, optical pumping of xenon and diamond systems for spin polarization,ex situ and mobile NMR and MRI, targeted NMR sensors for molecular imaging, ultralow and zero-field NMR and MRI, detection of magnetic resonance amplified by means of laser magnetometers, miniaturization of NMR, including its combination with microfluidic (“lab on a chip”) technologies – just to name a few of his outstanding published works. Professor Pines was recognized for these works by being named a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the Royal Society; holding honorary degrees from the Universities of Rome, Paris, Marseilles, Amritsar, and the Weizmann Institute of Science; and many awards included the Wolf Prize in Chemistry. In his honor, the Pines Magnetic Resonance Center (PMRC) at Berkeley was launched on November 28, 2023, at a gathering for the annual UC Berkeley Alexander Pines Endowed Lecture in Physical Chemistry.
As impressive as these works and recognitions are, perhaps most impactful are the Pinenuts, alumni of his laboratory whose names are recognizable to anyone in the magnetic resonance community. The Pinenuts are founders of companies, national lab researchers, imminent scholars, and members of their communities that seek to emulate the generosity, magnanimity, and personal engagement of Professor Pines. Long before the word underrepresented became important, Professor Pines was the cherished mentor for many female doctoral students, postdocs, and visitors, furthering their representation throughout education and industry,
Professor Pines was not only a pillar of our resonance community, but he also dedicated himself to teaching chemistry to thousands of Berkeley undergraduates, with particular attention to the introductory course for non-majors. Professor Pines won every teaching award given by the Berkeley campus, spending hundreds of hours preparing, then delivering, lectures on chemistry that were illustrated with demonstrations, group discussions, and novel assessment schemes that worked for a course with an enrollment of over one thousand per term. His keen insight into the visual display of information led to legendary (and sometimes controversial) talks, such as those employing road signs that poignantly highlighted popular culture as well as group theory. For those of us fortunate enough to have met Professor Pines, we recall his charisma and enthusiasm for art, music, and all fields of science were infectious.
Jeffrey Reimer
UC Berkeley, December 2024