Physical chemist Giacinto Scoles, Princeton’s Donner Professor of Science Emeritus, died in Sassenheim, Holland, on September 25 with his wife of nearly 60 years by his side. He was 89 years old.

“Giacinto was a superb scientist and an even better human being,” said Salvatore Torquato, Lewis Bernard Professor of Natural Sciences at Princeton and professor of chemistry and the Princeton Materials Institute. “A smile forms on my face, recalling the inimitable passion and excited gestures he brought to any scientific discussion. He was a force of nature and will be greatly missed by his family, friends and colleagues.”

“Giacinto had the creativity to find important problems on which he could make significant progress,” said Kevin Lehmann, a professor of chemistry at Princeton from 1985 to 2005, who published 56 joint papers with Scoles and is now at the University of Virginia. “He was always a leader in opening up new scientific fields and never one to jump on something because it was popular or because it was well funded. In studying his career, I learned that problem selection is far more important to making a significant scientific impact than other skills, such as the mathematical and analytical skills that are my own strengths.”

Throughout his career, Scoles straddled the fields of chemistry and physics, a charismatic and influential force in both. He made pioneering contributions to the study of intermolecular forces, molecule-surface interactions, and surface monolayers. His extensive knowledge of molecular beam technology led to his role in the design and development of an innovative machine called the cryogenic bolometer, a universal atomic and molecular beam detector that Scoles later used to detect the kinetic and internal energy of molecular beams.

Described by colleagues as both a generous and demanding scholar, Scoles was also known as “an excellent role model for what every scientist should strive to become”, according to a 2007 special tribute published in Journal of Physical Chemistry A.

Colleagues and friends from all over the world

Scoles’ scholarly career spanned six decades in four countries, including Italy, Canada, the United States, and the Netherlands.

“I met him before he came to Princeton, when he was in Italy. He was a great colleague and friend and was instrumental in bringing me to Princeton,” said Roberto Car, the Ralph W. *31 Dornte Professor of Chemistry. “He was a great experimenter and pioneer of molecular beam techniques, and he made very important advances in a technique with helium clusters at very, very low temperatures,” which led to his win. the prestigious Franklin Medal in Physics in 2006.

“He was a great person,” Car said. “He was an excellent colleague and a very important person to me.”

Scoles advised Annabella Selloni, now the David B. Jones Professor of Chemistry at Princeton, as she began her career at Princeton. “He was positive and helpful, almost fatherly, I would say,” Selloni said. “My research with him focused on the structure of self-assembled molecular layers on metal surfaces, mainly gold. Giacinto did the experimental work and had a deep understanding of physical systems; I did the math and tried to learn from him.”

“My father loved to get everyone excited about science and took every opportunity to do so,” said his daughter, Gigi Scoles. During a childhood visit to her science class at Princeton’s John Witherspoon Middle School, she “soaked a red rose in a thermos of liquid nitrogen and then tapped it on the desk at the front of the classroom, making it small pieces. which scattered in all directions. My classmate Bebe Telfair (née Elisabeth Schmierer) recalled that event as a ‘core memory’ some 35 years later, so it seems she was able to capture young minds about science.”

His daughter also remembered him organizing nanotechnology summer schools in Africa. “He believed in access to education for all, especially women and people in developing countries,” she said.

Lehmann, now William R. Kenan, Jr. Professor of Chemistry at the University of Virginia, called Scoles “a very close personal friend, one of the closest in my entire life.”

After his death, Lehmann and five of Scoles’ former students sent a memorial letter to colleagues. “Working with him meant a lifelong relationship, far beyond submitting a thesis or moving to another job or university,” they wrote. “He held himself and others to the highest intellectual and ethical standards, but he had a deep empathy for others. He always demanded excellence from his students, but all recognized that he cared deeply for them, not only as scientists but also as individuals.”

Born in Turin, Italy, on April 2, 1935, Scoles was the son of a mechanical engineer who worked for the car manufacturer Fiat. He spent his early childhood in a village outside Venice. He earned his degrees in chemistry from the University of Genoa, then began his academic career there. He organized and led the establishment of the experimental physics laboratory at the University of Trento in Italy; was co-founder of the Guelph-Waterloo Center for Graduate Work in Chemistry; and played a leading role in establishing the Princeton Materials Institute upon his 1987 appointment at Princeton.

Among his awards and honors, Scoles was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of the United Kingdom in 1997; was an elected foreign member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences; held two honorary doctorates (one in physics and one in science); and received the 2002 Peter Debye Award in Physical Chemistry and the 2003 Earle K. Plyler Award in Molecular Spectroscopy.

Scoles was transferred to emeritus status in July 2008, after which he held a professorship at the International School of Advanced Studies in Trieste, Italy, in collaboration with the Elettra Synchrotron Laboratories.

Scoles is survived by his wife of six decades, Giok Lan Scoles, and their daughter Gigi Mei Lan Scoles, who is currently serving overseas at the US Embassy in Mexico City. The family requests that contributions be made in his memory to an organization dedicated to finding a cure for Progressive Supranuclear Palsy (PSP): CurePSP at 325 Hudson St., Floor 4, New York, NY 10013. “I can think of no better way to honor my father’s memory than to continue scientific research into the disease that slowly caused his body to betray his brilliant scientific mind,” said Gigi Scoles.

View or share comments about a memorial page designed to honor Scoles’ life and legacy.