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20 - Chemical Physics and Quantum Chemistry in the Twentieth Century

from Part IV - Atomic and Molecular Sciences in the Twentieth Century

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2008

By
Ana Simões
Edited by
Mary Jo Nye
Mary Jo Nye
Affiliation:
Oregon State University
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Summary

In 1967, Per-Olov Löwdin introduced the new International Journal of Quantum Chemistry in the following manner:

Quantum chemistry deals with the theory of the electronic structure of matter: atoms, molecules, and crystals. It describes this structure in terms of wave patterns, and it uses physical and chemical experience, deep-going mathematical analysis, and high-speed electronic computers to achieve its results. Quantum mechanics has rendered a new conceptual framework for physics and chemistry, and it has led to a unification of the natural sciences which was previously inconceivable; the recent development of molecular biology shows also that the life sciences are now approaching the same basis.

Quantum chemistry is a young field which falls between the historically developed areas of mathematics, physics, chemistry, and biology.

In this chapter I address the emergence and establishment of a scientific discipline that has been called at times quantum chemistry, chemical physics, or theoretical chemistry. Understanding why and how atoms combine to form molecules is an intrinsically chemical problem, but it is also a many-body problem, which is handled by means of the integration of Schrödinger’s equation. The heart of the difficulty is that the equation cannot be integrated exactly for even the simplest of all molecules. Devising semiempirical approximate methods became, therefore, a constitutive feature of quantum chemistry, at least in its formative years.

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Information
The Cambridge History of Science , pp. 394 - 412
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2002

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