Zimmerman, Wolfhart

Born in Freiburg .

In 1946 he entered the University of Freiburg , where he studied mathematics and physics. In 1950 he defended his thesis on the topic “Cohomological theory of topological spaces” ( German Eine Cohomologietheorie topologischer Räume ) and received his doctoral degree ( Dr. rer. Nat. ). His supervisors were: first , and then Wilhelm Süss ^[1] .

In 1952-1957 he worked at , which at that time was located in Göttingen . There he joined the Werner Heisenberg group, in which he conducted joint research with and ^[2] .

Two academic years (1957–1958 and 1960–1961), he worked at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton ( New Jersey , USA ) ^[4] . In 1962 he received the position of professor at New York University . There he continued his scientific work and, in particular, developed the theory of renormalization in quantum field theory ^[2] .

In 1973 ^[5] (according to other sources, in 1974 ^[6] ) he moved to the Max Planck Institute for Physics and Astrophysics, which was located in Munich . After the separation of the institute in 1991, he continued work at , where he was a member of the board of directors, as well as the director of the institute. Until 1996, when he became an Emeritus Professor , the scientist led the Department of Quantum Field Theory and Elementary Particle Physics, which was part of the institute ^[5] .

Working together with and , he created an axiomatic description of quantum field theory, which later became known as Lehmann-Symanzik-Zimmermann formalism ( LSZ formalism ). Although this approach was originally formulated outside the framework of perturbation theory , it later proved to be very useful in describing the scattering amplitudes of elementary particles in the framework of perturbation theory ^[2] .

Working on the renormalization theory , he presented an explicit solution to the recursive procedure for obtaining final results for Feynman diagrams proposed by Nikolai Bogolyubov , Ostap Parasyuk and . Subsequently, this procedure, originally based on the Bogolyubov – Parasyuk theorem , was called the Bogolyubov – Parasyuk – Hepp – Zimmermann renormalization scheme (BPHC, English BPHZ renormalization scheme ) ^[2] .

• The Max Planck Medal (1991) ^[7] - "for his contribution to quantum field theory and renormalization theory" ^[3] .

• H. Lehmann, K. Symanzik, W. Zimmermann . Zur Formulierung quantisierter Feldtheorien , Nuovo Cimento, 1955, v. 1, No. 1, p. 205-225.
• W. Zimmermann . Convergence of Bogoliubov's method of renormalization in momentum space , Communications in Mathematical Physics, 1969, v. 15, No. 3, p. 208–234.
• W. Zimmermann . Composite operators in the perturbation theory of renormalizable interactions , Annals of Physics, 1973, v. 77, No. 1-2 p. 536-559.
• R. Oehme, W. Zimmermann . Relation between effective couples for asymptotically free models , Communications in Mathematical Physics, 1985, v. 97, No. 4, p. 569-582.