The Lars Onsager Lecture and Professorship
Lars Onsager (1903–1976)
Lars Onsager was a Norwegian-American chemist and physicist. Onsager was born in Oslo. He held a Ch.E. degree (1925) from NTH (Norwegian Institute of Technology, later NTNU Norwegian University of Science and Technology).
Onsager migrated to the USA in 1928, and became an American citizen in 1945. Onsager was a J. Willard Gibbs Professor at Yale University.
Onsager was awarded the The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1968 for his work done in 1931 on irreversible thermodynamics.
Lars Onsager Lecture 2019
The next Lars Onsager Lecture:
Lene Vestergaard Hau
Prof. Lene Vestergaard Hau, Mallinckrodt Professor of Physics and of Applied Physics at Harvard University, will present her Lars Onsager Lecture The Science and Art of Taming light – Nothing goes faster than light … usually! in Lecture room S8 in Sentralbygg 2 at Gløshaugen on Friday 18 October at 12:15–13:30. Note changed date!
For further information, please contact Professor Helge Holden, NTNU.
Lars Onsager Professorship 2019
Present Lars Onsager Professor:
Daan Frenkel
The Lars Onsager Professorship for 2019 has been awarded to Professor Daan Frenkel, University of Cambridge.
For further information, please contact Professors Signe Kjelstrup, Alex Hansen, or Professor Helge Holden, NTNU.
The Onsager Medal
The Onsager Lecturer and the Onsager Professor receive the Onsager Medal.
Artist: Harald Wårvik. Minted by The Mint of Norway (Det Norske Myntverket), Kongsberg, Norway.
The Lars Onsager Archive
Thanks to the generosity of Lars Onsager's sons and daughter, the Norwegian University of Science and Technology has established a Lars Onsager Archive.
The Lars Onsager Archive is located at the Dora Library (a repository library for the NTNU University Library) and the Gunnerus Library (the Special Collections of the NTNU University Library) in Trondheim, Norway.
A substantial part of the archive has now been made freely available in digital form:
Biographical Material
A general reference to the scientific works of Lars Onsager is:
- The Collected Works of Lars Onsager (with commentary)
P.C. Hemmer, H. Holden, S.K. Ratkje, editors
World Scientific, Singapore 1996 - A biography on Lars Onsager (pdf)
by P.C. Hemmer and E. Hiis Hauge is printed in the book «Norwegian Nobel Prize Laureates», (Olav Njølstad, ed.), Universitetsforlaget, 2006. - In Norwegian: Boken er også utgitt på norsk, «Norske nobelprisvinnere», (Olav Njølstad, red.) Universitetsforlaget, 2005.
The Onsager Committee
The Lars Onsager Lecture and the Lars Onsager Professorship are awarded by the Onsager Committee which consists of:
- Professor Helge Holden (Chairman), Department of Mathematical Sciences, NTNU (01.01.05 - 31.12.10)
- Professor Arne Brataas, Department of Physics, NTNU (01.09.08 - 31.12.10)
Regulations for the Lars Onsager Lecture and the Lars Onsager Professorship.
The Nobel Prize 1968
Video at YouTube: King Gustav VI Adolf of Sweden, Lars Onsager and other nobilities og prize winners.
Yale University
Lars Onsager in his office at the Sterling Chemistry Laboratory at Yale University.
Onsager stamp
Lars Onsager on stamp. Norwegian Post's 2003 series of stamps with Nobel Laureates.