© Copyright 2000 by the American Chemical Society
VOLUME 104, NUMBER 16, APRIL 27, 2000
Introduction to the Harvey Scher Festschrift† It is a true pleasure to dedicate to Harvey Scher this issue of The Journal of Physical Chemistry B. Harvey, in his usual kind-hearted manner, has spent so much of his time and energy giving and sharing research ideas with others that this volume provides an opportunity to honor Harvey and to give thanks back to him. We are presenting him with some beautiful science expositions that will engage us in many future conversations. Harvey’s reputation is based on thought-provoking innovative work directed toward explaining physics experiments. While Harvey is an excellent theorist, his work has always been grounded in the reality of experiments. Typically, Harvey’s work rises above the problem at hand to reveal more general physical principles. At the University of Pittsburgh and Bell Labs, Harvey worked on many-body effects due to strong electron-phonon interactions from which he was able to predict the far-infrared absorptivity of metals. At Xerox, he created a novel hopping transport theory of ac conductivity and photoconductivity in amorphous semiconductors. This highly cited work involved probability distributions with infinite moments and did for anomalous “slow” transport phenomena what scaling theory did for equilibrium phase transitions. Together with his work on continuum percolation discovering a universal critical percolation volume, these Xerox years alone have left a lasting mark on condensed matter physics. During his SOHIO/British Petroleum years there were excursions into a theory of fractal aggregates, a many-body approach to polymer reptation obtaining the elusive 10/3 reptation time exponent, models of material strength and breakdown, and experimental studies of electronic properties of disordered solids. Now at the Weizmann Institute, Harvey is making significant contributions to the important twentyfirst century problem of the dynamics of water tables. Harvey is well-known for his style of not rushing into print, but waiting, until he is satisfied that something important and valuable has been accomplished. He has left his mark on each of the above fields through highly cited, well-appreciated, original papers. As valuable as his work is the strong bond of friendship and giving that characterizes Harvey’s warm personality. He has enriched us scientifically and through his valued friendship. J. Klafter Tel-AViV UniVersity Israel Michael Shlesinger Office of NaVal Research
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Part of the special issue “Harvey Scher Festschrift”.
10.1021/jp000735q CCC: $19.00 © 2000 American Chemical Society Published on Web 03/24/2000
