Biographical Memoirs Volume 91 (2009) / Chapter Skim
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BRUNO HASBROUCK ZIMM
BRUNO HASBROUCK ZIMM
Pages 366-380
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From page 367... ...
He married Georgianna Grevatt in 1944, and together they raised two sons, Louis Zimm and Carl Zimm. Zimm's pioneering contributions to polymer chemistry laid the groundwork for modern research on biological and synthetic macromolecules, and established him as a founding father of the physical chemistry of macromolecules.
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From page 368... ...
At GE, Zimm published his two most highly cited papers: the report of the Zimm-Bragg theory of the transition between helix and coil in polypeptide chains (1959) and the theoretical description of polymer solution viscoelasticity and flow birefringence (1956)
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From page 369... ...
After becoming Professor Emeritus and no longer formally mentoring students and postdocs, Zimm published, each year until 2000, one or more papers, several single-authored and some from new collaborations. Zimm was the recipient of the National Academy of Sciences Award in the Chemical Sciences in 1981, the citation reading: For his contributions and influence in theoretical and experimental polymer chemistry, notably his work on polymer interactions, polymer visco-elasticity, the helix coil transition in bio-polymers, the theory of light scattering, and the study of extraordinarily large DNA molecules.
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From page 370... ...
Beckmann was mostly to blame for his and Stockmayer's conversion into polymer chemistry, but one cannot discount the seminal work of Paul Flory -- which drew Zimm's attention as a young physical chemist to the burgeoning field of polymer science -- and Paul Doty, a fellow doctoral student with Mayer. Together, Zimm and Doty contemplated how to measure the absolute molecular weight of polymeric molecules and distributions, a curiosity that eventually lead Zimm to measure molecular weights of the enormous chromosomal DNA molecules.
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From page 371... ...
Application of Zimm's plotting method yielded plenty of data revealing interesting new behavior of polymer solutions (1950) on which to build future theories.
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From page 372... ...
An elegant description of the calculation of the radii of gyration for branched polymers accounting for the effects of excluded volume appeared in a classic paper written with his close friend Stockmayer, or "Stocky" (1949)
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From page 373... ...
Oddly, but true to the nature of this great thinker, the idea occurred to Bruno during the mundane task of washing dishes, when he observed a drinking glass rotating in the dish water and realized from the swirling motion the advantage of rotating the inner cylinder. The culmination of these elegant studies was the measurement, by Bruno and biologist Ruth Kavenoff, of full-length DNA molecules from chromosomes of the fruit fly (Drosophila)
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From page 374... ...
REFLECTIONS Bruno Zimm was universally liked and respected as an exemplary scientist, teacher, and person. For the National Academy of Sciences Award in the Chemical Sciences, he was cited for research "that in the broadest sense contributes to better understanding of the natural sciences and to the benefit of humanity." He was not a man enslaved by professional ambitions.
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From page 375... ...
He loved to play the clarinet. For a number of years Friday lunchtime was spent playing duets in his office, and in the lab one could hear the sounds of Bach emanating from across the hall.
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From page 376... ...
He was also an avid sailor and doted on his beautiful wooden Norwegian sail boat, Altair. He took pride in maintaining it, and occasionally enlisted the help of a student or two for the required painting and refinishing, always followed by an invitation for a sail.
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From page 377... ...
18:830-839. 1956 Dynamics of polymer molecules in dilute solution: Viscoelasticity, flow birefringence, and dielectric loss.
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From page 378... ...
Simplified rotating cylinder viscometer for deoxyribonucleic acid.
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From page 379... ...
Dejardin. Theory of gel electrophoresis of DNA.
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