Arthur Poskanzer, a groundbreaker in exploring extreme states of nuclear matter, died peacefully in his home in Berkeley, California, on 30 June 2021.
Art was born in New York City on 28 June 1931. Because of an illness, he could not attend school and was self-taught until sixth grade. He went to Stuyvesant High School and then Harvard University, where he received a BS with honors in chemistry and physics in 1953. Following graduation, Art spent the summer at Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory and worked on chemical separation of heavy elements. He separated 1 gram of americium—at the time a large fraction of the world’s supply of the element—from plutonium.
In 1954 Art received an MS from Columbia University, where he worked with Jack Miller, and in 1957 was awarded a PhD from MIT. Advised by Charles Coryell, Art did his thesis on the chemical separation of heavy elements, his...
