Onsager, << AWN sahg uhr, >> Lars (1903-1976), a Norwegian-born American chemical physicist, was awarded the 1968 Nobel Prize for chemistry for his work in the field of science known as thermodynamics–the study of various forms of energy, such as heat and work.
Onsager’s early work focused on strong electrolytes (chemical solutions that conduct electric current). See Electrolyte . His most famous work covers the thermodynamics of what scientists call irreversible processes–processes that cannot be turned the other way, such as the flow of heat from a warm body to a cool one. He also studied colloids (substances composed of particles that are tiny but larger than most molecules), metals, and hydrodynamics.
Onsager was born in Kristiania (now Oslo), Norway. He studied chemical engineering at the Norwegian Institute of Technology in Trondheim and chemistry at the Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, Switzerland. In 1928, he moved to the United States and taught at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, and at Brown University, in Providence, Rhode Island. In 1945, he became professor of theoretical chemistry at Yale University, and in 1972, he left Yale to serve as distinguished university professor at the University of Miami, Florida. He became a U.S. citizen in 1945.
