Karl Herzfeld Biography

Karl Herzfeld’s rise through the scientific community can best be described as ‘meteoric.’ From a child attending several of Germany’s most prestigious schools to studying under one of the world’s most prolific physicist known to date, Herzfeld’s passion for science was cultivated early on in life, thus becoming his prime focus through the course of it. Over the length of sixty years of his career, Karl managed to contribute numerous findings to the field of physics, receiving overwhelming praise and admiration for his respect. In addition to his work in the sciences, he also served in the military—first as a soldier, then as a researcher. After becoming a naturalized U.S. citizen, Karl spent much of his later years lecturing at several American universities, including Fordham University and the University of Michigan. During this time, he managed to publish over 130 articles, as well as fourteen books, covering a number of topics which interested Herzfeld, including the mechanisms of sound absorption in gases, liquids, and solids and the foundations of statistical mechanics and thermodynamics. Additionally, he had great interest in philosophy, evident by his time spent at the Catholic University of America in Washington D.C., where he would serve as a professor until his death. To know more about his life and works read on