The Katzenstein Distinguished Lectures series continued in Fall 2016 for its 19th year, with an October 28, 2016 lecture by Professor Leon N. Cooper of Brown University, entitled “On the Interpretation of the Quantum Theory: Can Free Will And Locality Exist Together In The Quantum Theory?” Professor Cooper shared the 1972 Nobel Prize in Physics with Professors J. Bardeen and J. R. Schrieffer. The Nobel Prize was awarded for the first microscopic theory of superconductivity, now known as the BCS Theory. Superconductivity as evidenced by the disappearance of electrical resistivity was first observed in Mercury by Kamerlingh Onnes in 1911. Immediately, many theorists including Albert Einstein, set out to explain this newly observed phenomena. However it was not until 1933 that the essential property of magnetic flux exclusion was observed by Meissner and Ochsenfeld. No successful microscopic theory was developed until the 1957 Physical Review Paper that developed the BCS theory. A crucial element for the theory was published in a short letter to the Physical Review in 1956 by Leon Cooper, entitled ‘Bound Electron Pairs, in a degenerate Fermi Gas’. These pairs are now commonly referred to as ‘Cooper Pairs’.

The 2016 lecture took place in Physics Building Lecture Room P-36, and an excellent attendance included physics undergraduates, graduate students, faculty from Physics and other departments, and a number of UConn Physics alumni. Prior to the lecture, Professor Cooper met informally with Physics students in the Physics Library, and then met people at a reception that preceded the lecture. Following the lecture, Professor Cooper joined with Henry Katzenstein’s son David, a Professor at Stanford Medical School, along with faculty, staff, alumni and guests for a gala dinner at the University of Connecticut’s Foundation Building. The Katzenstein Lectures are made possible by an endowment established by the late Dr. Henry S. Katzenstein and his wife Dr. Constance A. Katzenstein. Cornell Professor David Lee (1996 Nobel Laureate in Physics and 1956 M. S. alumnus of UConn) gave the first lecture of the current series of annual lectures by Nobel Laureates, in 1997. Henry Katzenstein received the very first Ph.D. in physics from our Department in 1954 after only three years as a graduate student here.

This story was published in the University of Connecticut 2017 Annual Newsletter.