Willem Hendrik Keesom
Willem Hendrik Keesom was born on June 21, 1876. See ranking, bio blurb, and everyone else born that day.
About Willem Hendrik Keesom
Willem Hendrik Keesom () (21 June 1876, Texel – 3 March 1956, Leiden) was a Dutch physicist who, in 1926, invented a method to freeze liquid helium. He also developed the first mathematical description of dipole–dipole interactions in 1921. Thus, dipole–dipole interactions are also known as Keesom interactions. He was previously a student of Heike Kamerlingh Onnes, who had discovered superconductivity (a feat for which Kamerlingh Onnes received the 1913 Nobel Prize in Physics). He also discovered the lambda point transition specific-heat maximum between helium-I and helium-II in 1930. In 1924 he became member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 1966, the minor planet 9686 Keesom was named after him.