Frederick Seitz

Frederick Seitz (July 4, 1911 – March 2, 2008) was an American physicist, tobacco industry lobbyist, climate change denier and former head of the United States National Academy of Sciences.

Born in San Francisco on July 4, 1911, Seitz graduated from Lick-Wilmerding High School in the middle of his senior year, and went on to study physics at Stanford University obtaining his bachelor's degree in three years, graduating in 1932.

Seitz moved to Princeton University to study metals under Eugene Wigner, gaining his PhD in 1934.

He and Wigner pioneered one of the first quantum theories of crystals, and developed concepts in solid-state physics such as the Wigner–Seitz unit cell used in the study of crystalline material in solid-state physics.

He married Elizabeth K. Marshall on May 18, 1935.

Early in his academic career, Seitz served on the faculty of the University of Rochester (1935–37) and after an interlude as a research physicist at General Electric Laboratories (1937–39) he was at the University of Pennsylvania (1939–1942) and then the Carnegie Institute of Technology (1942–49).

After Seitz published a paper on the darkening of crystals, DuPont asked him in 1939 for help with a problem they were having with the stability of chrome yellow.

He became "deeply involved" in their research efforts.

Among other things, he investigated the possible use of non-toxic silicon carbide as a white pigment.

After graduate studies, Seitz continued to work on solid state physics, publishing The Modern Theory of Solids in 1940, motivated by a desire to "write a cohesive account of the various aspects of solid-state physics in order to give the field the kind of unity it deserved".

The Modern Theory of Solids helped unify and understand the relations between the fields of metallurgy, ceramics, and electronics.

He was also a consultant on many World War II-related projects in metallurgy, radiation damage to solids and electronics amongst others.

He, along with Hillard Huntington, made the first calculation of the energies of formation and migration of vacancies and interstitials in copper, inspiring many works on point defects in metals.

The scope of his published work ranged widely, also covering "spectroscopy, luminescence, plastic deformation, irradiation effects, physics of metals, self-diffusion, point defects in metals and insulators, and science policy".

From 1946 to 1947, Seitz was director of the training program in atomic energy at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

He was appointed professor of physics at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, in 1949, becoming chairman of the department in 1957 and dean and vice-president for research in 1964.

Seitz also served as an advisor to NATO.

From 1962 to 1969 Seitz served as president of the United States National Academy of Sciences (NAS), in a full-time capacity from 1965.

As NAS president he initiated the Universities Research Association, which contracted with the Atomic Energy Commission to construct the world's largest particle accelerator at the time, Fermilab.

Seitz was the 4th president of Rockefeller University from 1968 to 1978, and the 17th president of the United States National Academy of Sciences from 1962 to 1969.

Seitz was the recipient of the National Medal of Science, NASA's Distinguished Public Service Award, and other honors.

He founded the Frederick Seitz Materials Research Laboratory at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign and several other material research laboratories across the United States.

Seitz was also the founding chairman of the George C. Marshall Institute, a tobacco industry consultant, and a prominent climate change denier.

He was the president of Rockefeller University from 1968 to 1978 during which he helped to launch new research programs in molecular biology, cell biology, and neuroscience as well as creating a joint MD-PhD program with Cornell University.

Seitz was a director of Texas Instruments (1971–1982) and of Akzona Corporation (1973–1982).

He retired from Rockefeller University in 1979, when he was made President Emeritus.

Shortly before his 1979 retirement from Rockefeller University, Seitz began working as a permanent consultant for the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, advising their medical research program until 1988.

Reynolds had previously provided "very generous" support for biomedical work at Rockefeller.

Seitz later wrote that "The money was all spent on basic science, medical science," and pointed to Reynolds-funded research on mad cow disease and tuberculosis.

Nonetheless, later academic studies of tobacco industry influence concluded that Seitz, who helped allocate $45m of Reynolds' research funding, "played a key role... in helping the tobacco industry produce uncertainty concerning the health impacts of smoking."

In 1984 Seitz was the founding chairman of the George C. Marshall Institute, and was its chairman until 2001.

According to a tobacco industry memo from 1989, Seitz was described by an employee of Philip Morris International as "quite elderly and not sufficiently rational to offer advice."

The Institute was founded to argue for President Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative, but "in the 1990s it branched out to become one of the leading think tanks trying to debunk the science of climate change."

A 1990 report co-authored with Institute co-founders Robert Jastrow and William Nierenberg "centrally informed the Bush administration's position on human-induced climate change".

The Institute also promoted environmental skepticism more generally.

In 1994, the Institute published a paper by Seitz titled Global warming and ozone hole controversies: A challenge to scientific judgment. Seitz questioned the view that CFCs "are the greatest threat to the ozone layer".

In the same paper, commenting on the dangers of secondary inhalation of tobacco smoke, he concluded "there is no good scientific evidence that passive inhalation is truly dangerous under normal circumstances."

Seitz was a central figure amongst global warming deniers.

Seitz died March 2, 2008, in New York.

He was survived by a son, three grandchildren, and four great-grandchildren.