Peter Atkins
Chemist and science author
Peter Atkins is an English chemist who taught at Oxford for many years. He has written chemistry textbooks and popular science books for general readers.
2 summaries 40 min of listening
British Born 1940 in Amersham, United Kingdom
About Peter Atkins
Peter Atkins was born in England in 1940 and studied chemistry at the University of Leicester, where he also earned his PhD in 1964. After a year at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) as a Harkness Fellow, he joined Oxford University as a lecturer in physical chemistry and Fellow of Lincoln College. He stayed there until he retired in 2007. He has written textbooks including Physical Chemistry, Inorganic Chemistry and Molecular Quantum Mechanics, as well as popular science books such as On Being. His books number close to 70. He was also the founding chairman of the Committee on Chemistry Education of the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry. He has held visiting professorships in Japan, China, Israel, France and New Zealand. Atkins is an outspoken atheist and humanist. He was the first Senior Member of the Oxford University Secular Society.