"These are the last 20 minutes of peace in your life," the Swedish caller told Caltech professor Ahmed Zewail at 5:40 a.m. on October 12.

Soon the world would hear of Zewail’s award–the 1999 Nobel Prize in chemistry–and Zewail would hear from the world. The Linus Pauling Professor of Chemical Physics and professor of physics would be so busy that he’d forget he’d woken up with a cold. Two thousand e-mails would zoom his way within a few days and three phone lines would start ringing with fervent requests for interviews from the national and Egyptian press and with congratulations from friends and colleagues. But first, the 53-year-old man would share the news with his family.

He kissed his wife, Dema, and young sons, Nabeel and Hani. His mother, whom Zewail reached in his native Egypt, cried and cried. His daughters, Caltech alum Maha and Berkeley chemistry student Amani, "were going crazy on the phone. I couldn’t even speak," said Zewail.

"I was disappointed in Nabeel’s reaction," he added, recounting his first week in the Nobel limelight and looking not one bit disappointed. "I told him I had won the prize. He said, ‘Good.’" But when Zewail asked if he’d tell the kids at school, the six-year-old said, "No. These guys will say ‘So what?’" But Nabeel did ask, "Are we going to see the king?"

The Royal Swedish Academy honored Zewail for his groundbreaking work in viewing and studying chemical reactions at the atomic level as they occur. He has shown "that it is possible with rapid laser technique to see how atoms in a molecule move during a chemical reaction."

By combining ultrafast laser technology with molecular beam studies in a novel way, Zewail’s Caltech team was able to record the transition state of a chemical reaction, revealing "the chemical act–the breaking and making of chemical bonds," in Zewail’s words. Prior to the team’s 1987 breakthrough, transition states had never before been observed in real time because they happen on the time scale of a millionth of a billionth of a second, or one femto-
second. Zewail had brought the most powerful tools from the field of physics into the chemistry lab to create a revolution, and the field of femto-chemistry was born. It was "a revolution in chemistry and adjacent sciences," the Swedes announced, "since this type of investigation allows us to understand and predict important reactions," to probe nature at its most fundamental level.

"In my experience," said Zewail after a tumultuous week, "whenever you cross fields or bring in new ideas and tools, you find what you don’t expect. You open new windows."

Sometimes you win Nobel Prizes. For several years, colleagues have been predicting that Zewail would win one as breakthroughs led to top awards, including the Welch Prize, the King Faisal Prize, the Wolf Prize, and the Carl Zeiss Award. What did Zewail predict?

"I knew it was possible. People would tell me, I would see in magazines that I was on the short list. I’m not in a vacuum. But I didn’t live with the concept that it must happen. In fact, I didn’t have the confidence that it would."

What does it take to win a Nobel Prize? Caltech’s newest Nobelist said that the prizes go to "a whole spectrum of people, from someone who is a genius, to someone who is extremely innovative and creative, to someone who is lucky, to someone who has done systematic scholarly work for 40 years." Which one is he? "I won’t tell you." Who will? "Vince can."

Vince McKoy, Caltech professor of theoretical chemistry, said that Zewail "has incredibly perceptive insight and a flair of genius." McKoy is one of many people who speak of Zewail and Caltech’s famous Nobelist Linus Pauling in the same breath. "There’s a sense of continuity between what Pauling and Zewail have done." Pauling revealed the structure of the chemical bond, "and Zewail picked up the ball and went running further downfield by showing how bonds are made and broken," said McKoy.

"That is the great excitement," Caltech President David Baltimore, a Nobel laureate himself, told the press on October 12. "To be able to see what happens when fundamental processes occur . . . that’s the kind of discovery for which a Nobel Prize is given." Zewail added that he is "just so pleased" that both Pauling’s prize concerning the structure and his concerning the dynamics of the chemical bond are from Caltech.

Zewail is the 27th Caltech faculty member or alum to receive the Nobel Prize (Pauling won two), and the third faculty member to be so honored in this decade. Edward Lewis
received the prize for physiology or medicine in 1995, and Rudy Marcus won for chemistry in 1992.

Zewail’s path to the forefront of the international science arena has been
elegant and swift, like the atoms he observes performing intricate molecular dances. With a wealth of experience in igniting home chemistry projects as a boy in Egypt ("my mother thought I was going to burn down the house"), he sailed to the top of his class at
Alexandria University. The classical science education he received there groomed him for a promised tenure-track position in the field of his choice: math, physics, chemistry, or geology. He chose chemistry but was most interested in "applying physics and math to the world of chemistry, not in a traditional way."

That goal was "crystallized" when he decided to get his PhD at the University of Pennsylvania–to "see the molecular world of chemistry." He had heard of Caltech, but to this young Egyptian, "institute" sounded less prestigious than "university." As it turned out, Penn provided the "ideal" transition from classical science studies to the postdoctoral work he did at UC Berkeley. Had he come to Caltech initially, he says, he would have felt he had to "behave like a Feynman."

He stayed at Berkeley for postdoctoral work for two reasons: to think more about research rather than about getting a PhD and "the secret reason–I wanted to buy a big American car to take back to Egypt with me." At Berkeley, he published three papers "immediately" and was advised to apply to the top handful of American universities, if for no other reason than to enjoy traveling around for the interviews. Impressed by the flood of offers that followed, and lured by the "American magnet," a system that rewards good work, Zewail stayed.

"The most important reason why I decided on Caltech was, once the offer was made, I was well received by the staff, administration, and faculty. " He also felt he could make his own way specializing in dynamics in a department strong on structure, a Linus Pauling legacy. And the Mediterranean climate didn’t hurt. That was 1976.

Zewail was off and running, earning tenure in a year and a half, making full professor by 1982, seated in the Pauling Chair by 1990. Now with a Nobel Prize under his belt, what’s next? "First of all, I’m not retiring," he said. "And I’m not going to Hollywood."

One thing that the prize will help him do, said Zewail, is "excite young people about science in the United States and Egypt," especially fundamental science. He will visit high schools such as the one in Alexandria that already bears his name and to which he will donate a portion of his Nobel Prize money.

In the coming years, Zewail looks forward to more breakthroughs as his research team from six Caltech laboratories observes fundamental processes of complex chemical and biological systems on the femtosecond time scale. He will remain active in research and in publishing papers, which he considers to be his babies (363 to date). Tracking the progress of two papers within a week of receiving the prize, he reached a surprised editor who said, "You on the phone? Impossible! I thought you’d be out wining and dining." He will continue to push the envelope of what is possible.

"You see, if it’s all what you know, and it’s possible, then you’re not going to see the thrill, and the fun, and the new surprises. That’s the point."

Hillary Bhaskaran

Zewail links you might want to view:
Caltech press release
Royal Swedish Academy
Background and information on Zewail
Femtoland Homepage