Klaus Pinkau

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Klaus Pinkau (born April 3, 1931 in Leipzig ) is a German astrophysicist and plasma physicist. Between 1981 and 1999 he was "Scientific Director" of the Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics in Garching.

Life

Pinkau did an apprenticeship as a reproduction photographer in Leipzig and then studied mathematics at the University of Tübingen from 1951 (among others with Erich Kamke ) and from 1953 physics at the University of Hamburg in Erich Bagge's group with a diploma in 1956. In 1955 he started the University of Bristol in the working group of Cecil Powell , where Bagge had sent him to learn the nuclear track emulsion technique in the study of cosmic rays. At that time, cosmic radiation was still a natural substitute for accelerators in high-energy physics, but its importance was already fading. In Bristol, Pinkau developed a method from the cascade showers, which generate high-energy gamma quanta to determine their original energy. He received his doctorate in Bristol in 1958 and was research assistant there until 1960. In 1960 he went back to Germany to join Bagge, who had meanwhile transferred to the Christian Albrechts University in Kiel . There he completed his habilitation in 1963 and was then a private lecturer. 1964/65 he was visiting professor at Louisiana State University . He turned down a call to a full professorship at the Louisiana State University in order to go to the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics in Garching in Munich at the invitation of Reimar Lüst with the aim of researching extraterrestrial gamma sources. There he was a pioneer of gamma-ray astronomy in Germany. He turned down a call as professor for astronomy in Tübingen in 1969 and became deputy director and from 1972 to 1977 managing director of the MPI for extraterrestrial physics. During this time, his institute was in charge of the COS-B satellite, which was launched in 1975. At the same time he was from 1969 professor at the Technical University of Munich .

In 1981 he turned to plasma physics and fusion research when he became scientific director of the Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics, which he remained until 1999. When he took up his post as director, the institute was in a difficult position; in 1978 it was defeated by the British Culham in the application for the Joint European Torus . Under his direction, ASDEX Upgrade was developed there from 1982 , which went into operation in 1991. From 1987 to 1990 he was Chairman of the Council of the Joint European Torus. Another success of his time as director was the approval of Wendelstein 7-X in 1995.

He also continued to study gamma-ray astronomy and was a senior scientist in NASA's EGRET experiment at Compton Gamma Ray Observatory in the 1990s .

He is a member of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences , was its vice director and was chairman of its founding committee from 1980 to 1990. He was temporarily chairman of the scientific advisory committee of the ESA and of the expert committee of major projects in basic research of the Federal Ministry of Research. He was a member of the Senate of the Max Planck Society and until 1999 Chairman of the Advisory Committee of the European Union on Fusion Programs. In 2004 he became scientific director of the Alfried Krupp Wissenschaftskolleg Greifswald .

honors and awards

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ University of Bristol - HH Wills Physics Laboratory - Portrait Gallery. University of Bristol, p. 109 , accessed January 3, 2014 .
  2. ^ Members of the previous academies. Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences, accessed on January 3, 2014 .
  3. ^ Members: Klaus Pinkau. Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences, accessed on January 3, 2014 .
  4. ↑ APS fellows - Archive. American Physical Society, accessed January 3, 2014 .
  5. ^ Membership directory: Klaus Pinkau. Academia Europaea, accessed on July 13, 2017 .
  6. ↑ Prize winners. Wilhelm Exner Foundation of the Austrian Trade Association, accessed on January 3, 2014 .
  7. ^ Honorary doctorate for Professor Pinkau. In: idw - Information Service Science. Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics, June 10, 1998, accessed on January 3, 2014 .
  8. ↑ Bavarian Maximilian Order for Science and Art. In: Kulturpreise.de. Retrieved January 3, 2014 .
  9. ↑ Scientific awards. In: Jahresheft 2003. Helmholtz Gesellschaft, p. 64 , accessed on January 3, 2014 .
  10. ↑ a b c biography. Alfred Krupp Wissenschaftskolleg Greifswald, accessed on January 3, 2014 .
personal data
SURNAME Pinkau, Klaus
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German physicist
DATE OF BIRTH April 3, 1931
PLACE OF BIRTH Leipzig