Early life and education
Horst Ludwig Störmer belongs to the record of physics as one of those whose work outlasted the questions that prompted it.
Horst Ludwig Störmer was born at Frankfurt in 1949. His recorded nationality is Germany. He was educated at Goethe University Frankfurt and University of Stuttgart.
Twentieth-century science was collaborative, expensive and political: the questions were pursued by teams, and the answers had consequences that reached well past the laboratory.
Professional career
He held appointments at Bell Labs and Columbia University, where the work centred on physics.
Physics rewards the awkward question, and punishes the elegant answer that no instrument can confirm.
Geographic influences on scientific research
Working from Germany shaped what was possible. Access to instruments, collections, journals and colleagues has always been geographic, and the history of science is partly a history of that inequality.
Honours and awards
The honours are a fair index of how the work was received - Benjamin Franklin Medal (1998), Nobel Prize in Physics (1998), Knight Commander's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany and Benjamin Franklin Medal in Physics (1998).
Legacy and current status
Read now, the significance is less in any single result than in the fact that the results held. Physics is cumulative, and a contribution counts if the next generation could stand on it.
His recorded remarks are gathered further down this page.
Horst Ludwig Störmer is still working, and the final assessment of his contribution has not been made - the ordinary condition of a living scientist.
Achievements
- Benjamin Franklin Medal — 1998
- Nobel Prize in Physics — 1998
- Knight Commander's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany
- Benjamin Franklin Medal in Physics — 1998
- Held posts at Bell Labs and Columbia University
- Educated at Goethe University Frankfurt and University of Stuttgart
- Fields of research: physics
