Professor Herbert Gleiter received his Ph.D. in Physics from the University of Stuttgart, Germany. In 1973, Gleiter became Chair Professor of Materials Science at the University of the Saarland in Germany In 1994, he was appointed Member of the Executive Board of the Research Center Karlsruhe, Germany, and 4 years later he became the Founding Director of the Center's Institute of Nanotechnology. In 2012 the University of Nanjing of Science and Technology founded the "Herbert Gleiter Institute of Nanoscience" and appointed him as the Institute's Founding Director as well as Zijin Professor of this University. He is currently the Director of the Herbert Gleiter International Research Institute of Liaoning Academy of Materials (LAM), China.

Among Gleiter's more than 40 awards and honors are the Masing Prize of the German Society for Metals (1972); the Leibniz Prize of the German National Science Foundation (1988); Max-Plack Research Prize (1993); Gold Medal of the Federation of European Material Societies (1995); Heyn Medal of the German Society for Materials Science (1998); Heisenberg Medal (1998) and Humboldt Medal (2006); Gold Medal of Acta Materialia (2007); the Von Hippel Award of MRS (2008); the Mehl Award of the TMS Society (2009), the 2009 Blaise Pascal Medal of the European Academy of Sciences and the Cothenius Medal, the highest award of the German National Academy. His publications have been cited more than 22 000 times.

He is a Member of various Academies of Science and/or Engineering: e.g. of the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina (1999), US National Academy of Engineering (2004), Indian National Academy of Engineering (2006), the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2004), the Indian National Academy of Sciences (2009), the European Academy of Sciences (2009), the European Academy of Sciences and Arts (2014) , the Academia Europaea and the EU Academy of Sciences (2014), US National Academy of Inventors (2017), Chinese Academy of Sciences (2021), Liaoning Academy of Materials (2023) and the CORE Academy in the Division of Natural Sciences & Engineering and Applied Sciences (2023).

Professional Career

1. 2023: Director of the Herbert Gleiter International Research Institute of Liaoning Academy of Materials (LAM), China
2. 2021: Founding Director of the Herbert Gleiter International Laboratory of the Chinese Academy of Science at Shenyang, China
3. Since 2015: Senior Fellow of the Hong Kong Institute for Advanced Study, City University of Hong Kong
4. Since 2012: Director and Chair Professor of  the Herbert Gleiter Institute of  Nanoscience of Nanjing   University of Science and Technology, Nanjing, P.R.China
5. Since 2006: Senior Scientist at the Institute of Nanotechnology, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT),   Germany
6. 2007 - 2010: Distinguished Professor, Arizona State University, Phoenix, USA
7. 2005: Distinguished Scholar of the Korean Research Foundation, Seoul, Korea
8. 2004 - 2007: Kuang-pui Chair Professor, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, PR China
9. 1998 - 2004: Director of the Institute of Nanotechnology, Research Center Karlsruhe, Germany
10. 1994 - 1998: Member of the Executive Board of the Research Center Karlsruhe, Germany
11. 1987 - 1994: Founding Director of the Institute of New Materials, Saarbruecken, Germany
12. 1982: Call to the Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) Zurich, Switzerland
13. 1980: Call to the University of Hamburg-Harburg, Germany
14. 1973 - 1994: Professor/Director of the Institute of Material Science, University of the Saarland, Germany
15. 1972: Professor, Institute of Materials Science, University Bochum, Germany
16. 1971: Visiting Sientist of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, USA
17. 1970: D. Sc. in Material Science at the University of Bochum, Germany
18. 1966 - 1969: Research Fellow at Harvard University Cambridge, USA
19. 1966: Ph.D. in Physics at the Technical University of Stuttgart, Germany
20. 1959 - 1965: Student of Mechanical Engineering and Physics at the Technical University of Stuttgart, Germany

 

Honours and Awards (selection)

1. 2023: Fellow and Member of the Core Academy in the Division of Natural Sciences & Engineering and Applied Sciences
2. 2023: Honorary Doctorate of the School of Materials of Lanzhou University China
3. 2023: Member of Liaoning Academy of Materials (LAM), Shenyang, China
4. 2022: Stookey Award of Discovery American Ceramic Society
5. 2021: Fellow of Lanzhou University and the Chinese Academy of Science
6. 2021: Honorary Doctorate in Physics, University of Lanzhou, China
7. 2020: Director of the Herbert Gleiter International Laboratory (Shenyang, China) of the Chinese Academy of Science
8. 2020: Researcher of the Year Award of 2020 by the International Association of Advanced Materials, Advanced Materials
9. 2020: Laureate of the International Association of Advanced Materials
10. 2019: Jan Czochralski Medal and Award, Polish Academy of Science, Warsaw University
11. 2017: Member of the US National Academy of Inventors
12. 2015: Honorary Doctorate of the City University of Hong Kong
13. 2015: Received the Cothenius Medal from the German National Academy of Sciences
14. 2014: 2014 Distinguished Lecture Award, City University Hong Kong
15. 2012: Award of Zijin Chair Professorship of the Herbert Gleiter Institute of Nanoscience of the Nanjing University of Science and Technology, Nanjing, China
16. 2012: Nanomaterials Award 2012
17. 2012: Edward DeMille Campbell Award, American Society for Metals (ASM)
18. 2009: R.F. Mehl Award of the Minerals, Metals, Materials Society, USA
19. 2009: Blaise Pascal Medal of the European Academy of Sciences, Belgium
20. 2009: NANO Today Award of the Agency for Science, Technology Research, Singapore
21. 2008: Honorary Doctorate of the University of Muenster, Germany
22. 2008: Honorary Doctorate of the Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) Zurich, Switzerland
23. 2008: Achievement Award NANOSPD Int. Steering Committee
24. 2008: Staudinger-Durrer  Award of the Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) Zurich, Switzerland
25. 2008: Von Hippel Award of the Materials Research Society, USA
26. 2007: Gold Medal of Acta Materialia
27. 2006: Humboldt Medal of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, Germany
28. 2005: Distinguished Scholar of the Korean Research Foundation
29. 2004: Member and Honorary Professor/Doctor  of Lanzhou University, PR China
30. 2004: H. Lee Lecture Award of Chinese Academy of Science
31. 2004: Honorary Professor at Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, PR China
32. 2003: Nanomaterials Award of the Deutsche Bank, Germany
33. 2002: Honorary Doctorate of the Technical University of Darmstadt, Germany
34. 2000: Van Horn Award of Case Western University Cleveland, USA
35. 1999: Werner Heisenberg Medal of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, Germany
36. 1998: Heyn Medal of the German Society for Materials Science
37. 1995: Gold Medal of the Federation of European Material Societies (FEMS), Belgium
38. 1993: Vinci of Excellence Award of the Hennessy-Vuitton Foundation,  France
39. 1993: Max-Planck-Research Prize of the Humboldt Foundation and the Max Planck-Society, Germany
40. 1992: Member of the President’s Council of the University of Illinois, USA
41. 1992: TMS Lecture Award of the US Minerals, Metals and Materials Society
42. 1991: Order of Merit of Saarland, Germany
43. 1988: Leibniz Prize of the German National Science Foundation (DFG)
44. 1984: Alcoa Prize of the Alcoa Foundation, USA
45. 1979: Karl-Schurz Award of the University of Wisconsin, USA
46. 1972: Masing Prize of the German Society for Metals

 

Three most Highly Cited Publications

1. Nanocrystalline materials
   H. Gleiter
   Progress in Materials Science 33  223-315 (1989)
   Times cited 3100
2. Nanostructured materials. Basic Concepts and Microstructure
   H. Gleiter
   Acta Materialia  48  1-29  (2000)
   Times cited 1600
3. Ceramics ductile at low temperatures
   J. Karch, R. Birringer, H. Gleiter
   Nature  330  556-558  (1987)
   Times cited 790

 

Scientific Contributions

1. Probing the Limits of Quantum Physics by diffraction experiments with nano-clusters with sizes of up to 20 million atomic mass units.
2. Proposing and pioneering a New Kind of non-crystalline Materials (Nanoglasses) with defect/chemical microstructures similarly to the ones of today’s crystalline materials. Nanoglasses permit the development of new technologies based on non-crystalline materials instead of today’s (crystalline materials based) technologies.
3. Pioneering and development  of a new class of materials: Nanostructured Materials
4. Proposal of today’s accepted atomistic  model of the atomic structure of  grain boundaries:  the Structural Unit Model of Grain Boundaries
5. Development of the Dislocation Pair Model of all modern High Temperature Superalloys

 

Publications/Exhibitions about Herbert Gleiter

1. A.Nordmann, Perspectives on Sciences  17, 2009, 123 -  MIT Press Journals, doi:10.1162/posc.2009.17.2.123
2. Nanotechnologien im Kontext,  A.Nordmann, J.Shummer, A.Schwarz Eds., Akademische Verlagsgesellschaft, 2006, Berlin, Germany; ISBN 3-89838-074-2
3. Invisible Origins of Nanotechnology: Herbert Gleiter, http://www.philosophie.tu-darmstadt.de
4. Pionier der Nanowissenschaften, www.chemie.de/news/d/96897/
5. German Museum Munich,
   Center of New Technologies – Permanent Exhibition on Nano- and
   Biotechnology.: The discovery of Nanomaterials by Herbert Gleiter
6. Listed in Wikipedia and various  “ Who is Who“
7. DIE ZEIT: Auf zu neuen Dimensionen, www.zeit de/2005/26/nano